By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Sep 7: The Hill Farmers’ Union, responsible for spearheading the movement for the welfare of farmers in the state, has stated that Meghalaya Governor Satya Pal Malik has assured the Union to take up the plight of the state farmers with the Centre as well as the state government within a week.
The Union has submitted a six-point agenda to the Governor highlighting the plight of farmers and the way forward which includes financial relief, coverage of landless and tenant farmers under PM Kisan Yojana, action against arbitrary deduction by traders on farmer’s produce brought for sale, implementation of market intervention scheme, setting up of scientific storage at the village-level and collection centre at the production cluster-level and opening up of more Border Haats at the international border with Bangladesh
“The Governor has assured us that within a week’s time he will address the issues raised by us point by point accordingly with the state government and the Ministry,” HFU president, Commander Shangpliang, said after meeting the Governor on Tuesday.
Stating that the onslaught of COVID-19 has had a major impact on the farming community of the state, Shangpliang stated, “Farmers have had to bear huge losses during the period of lockdown leading to immense financial hardship and in many cases, children of farmers have had to drop out of schools”.
He added in this context, there is an urgent need to provide financial relief to farmers, particularly the landless and tenant farmers who are not beneficiaries of the Prime Minister Kisan Yojana.
The Union has claimed that the farmers have not received any financial assistance from the state government spite reeling under the financial losses owing to the pandemic-induced lockdowns.
On the demand for coverage of landless and tenants farmers under PM Kisan, Shangpliang said, “In Meghalaya about 1.94 lakh farmers are beneficiaries of this scheme. However, the scheme does not cover landless and tenant farmers”.
“It is our request that this issue be taken up with the concerned Ministry of the Government of India so that tenant farmers and those farming in community land, who do not posses land documents, be brought under the scheme,” he added.
On the demand for action against arbitrary deduction by traders on farmers’ produce brought for sale, the HFU president explained that there is a practice in markets in Khasi and Jaintia Hills, wherein traders arbitrarily deduct 10 per cent from the produce brought by farmers to markets for sale and payment is made only for 90 per cent. “This severely impacts the income of farmers, and in most cases, they are unable to do anything as there exists a tacit collusion among all traders in the markets,” he added.
“We demand of the state government, district administration, autonomous district councils and the local authority (Syiems) to make concerted efforts and take strict penal action under existing laws/make rules and strengthening of regulated market to eradicate this malpractice,” he added.
Pointing out that the central government has been providing price support to farmers in the form of Minimum Support Price (MSP) for 22 crops, he, however, said that the MSP does not cover horticulture crops and other produce cultivated by farmers in Meghalaya for which there is another price support mechanism in the form of Market Intervention Scheme (MIS).
Stating that Meghalaya has not been implementing the MIS for many years now, Shangpliang said, “It is our demand that the MIS be implemented regularly in the state and that the Meghalaya government declares major crops to be brought under MIS”.