Farmers' group says Centre's MSP not as per promised formula

An umbrella body of 182 farmers' organisations today expressed dismay over the Minimum Support Price declared for Kharif crops by the Centre recently.

The Rashtriya Kisan Mahasangh said that Centre's MSP formula was not based on the C2+50 (comprehensive cultivation cost plus 50 per cent) recommendation made by the National Commission on Farmers headed by M S Swaminathan.

The RKM's core committee member Jagjit Singh Dallewala, while addressing a press conference here, said that the Union government had failed to keep its promise of basing the MSP on the formula recommended by the Swaminathan Commission.

"We were promised by the Centre during social activist Anna Hazare's fast in Delhi that the farmers would be provided C2+50 formula (comprehensive cultivation cost plus 50 per cent) as suggested in the Swaminathan (Commission) report. The same was promised by the BJP during the 2014 elections but it has not been fulfilled," Dallewala said.

He, along with the RKM's convener Shivkumar Sharma Kakkaji, are in the city as part of the organisation's "Kisan Adhikar Yatra" which began on July 26 from Jammu and Kashmir and will culminate at Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu on August 26.

Dallewala, who is also the state president, Bhartiya Kisan Union Ekta (Sidhupur), Punjab, said the yatra was being held to demand farm loan waivers as well as the right MSP for crops.

He claimed that farmer suicides were on the rise and immediate steps needed to be taken to mitigate the agrarian crisis in the country.

Speaking at the press meet, Kakkaji said that the RKM had no political affiliation and would help the forces that helped farmers.

He said the yatra was not to appeal for votes but to raise issues of farmers.