Farmers block rail tracks, threaten to intensify stir as prices drop

Social media was agog with reports that a farmer in Maharashtra has complained of being fleeced by a trader to whom he sold cotton outside the mandi.

For Rahul Gujjar, a soybean grower from Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh, the latest changes to the farm marketing setup haven’t been very beneficial.

Though it is early days, Gujjar says with mandis closed in MP due to an indefinite strike by traders against the three new laws, he is being compelled to sell the early sown varieties of soybean at least Rs 1,200-1,500 below the state mandated minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 3,880 per quintal.

In Uttar Pradesh, too, the initial paddy crop was selling much below the MSP of Rs 1,868 per quintal for the past few days at some