Indian
Farmer's Final Solution
By Devinder Sharma
28 June, 2004
Zmag
Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S.Rajasekhar
Reddy is in a quandary. Ever since he took over as the chief minister
more than a month, on May 14, more than 300 farmers have committed suicides.
This was the official death toll in the suicides register till June
25. Unofficially, the death toll is estimated to be much higher.
The spurt in farmers
suicides, which unfortunately has failed to move the state as well as
the Congress-led Coalition at the Centre, is the outcome of the utter
neglect and apathy of the erstwhile Chandrababu Naidu's government in
Andhra, voted out after nine years in power. The situation in several
other states, including the frontline agriculture states of Punjab and
Haryana, and even in the left-ruled West Bengal and Kerala is no better.
Thousands of farmers have ended their lives in the past few years. What
has meanwhile baffled the new government is that the spate of suicides
shows no signs of ending even after it announced a series of routine
packages - free electricity and more credit -- aimed at relieving farmer's
misery.
The package also
includes an ex-gratia payment of Rs 1 lakh each to the next of the kin
of the deceased, and Rs 50,000 for a one-time settlement of the loans
of indebted farmers. The erstwhile government too had started paying
an ex-gratia grant of Rs 1 lakh to the affected families after suicides
were initially reported in 1997-98. After giving the assistance to some
250 farmer families, the payments were stopped on the plea that such
an ex-gratia would prompt more farmers to take their lives. The Congress,
then in the opposition, had stepped in by collecting donations for providing
assistance to the grieving families.
Although the newly-elected
government of Andhra Pradesh (and followed closely by Tamilnadu) have
moved in quickly by announcing free power to farmers, what is more depressing
is that the governments are clueless of the reasons that forces farmers
to commit suicides. Nor is there any effort from the so-called distinguished
agricultural scientists, economists, and social scientists to come out
with proposals to put an end to this shameful blot on the country's
image. The reason is obvious. No one has the political courage to point
a finger at the real villain -- industrial farming model that shifts
the focus on cash crops and thereby plays havoc with sustainable livelihoods.
Mr N Chandrababu
Naidu in Andhra Pradesh was swept away by a tidal wave of the angry
farmers. The small and marginal farmers, in tandem with the landless
labourers, who constitute nearly 80 per cent of Andhra's 80 million
people, gave their verdict: the industry-sponsored economic reforms
are anti-poor. In Karnataka too, where the farmers suicide rate is equally
high, the over-emphasis on technology had only alienated a large percentage
of farming populations from economic growth and development. Both the
States had relied heavily on the British consultancy firm, McKinsey
India Ltd., to draw the blueprint for economic reforms. In adition,
McKinsey's services are also being utilised by West Bengal for re-designing
the economic model of growth.
Blindly aping the
World Bank model of agriculture (as suggested by McKinsey India Ltd.),
Karnataka and Andhra had pumped in huge finances to push in an industry-driven
agriculture that has not only exacerbated the crisis leading to an environmental
catastrophe but also destroyed millions of rural livelihoods. The biggest
tragedy being that both the States had turned into a national capital
of shame for farmers' distress, visible more through the increasing
rate of suicides in the rural areas. Making available cheap credit to
these marginal farming communities, as has been announced by the Finance
Minister, will not be helpful. What these poor and marginalised need
immediately is income support.
In reality, Andhra
as well as Karnataka were only making it smoother for the industry to
move into the rural areas. APs Vision 2020 document talked of reducing
the number of farmers in the state to 40 per cent of the population,
and did not have any significant programme to adequately rehabilite
the remaining 30 per cent of the farming population. The objective was
to promote the commercial interests of the agribusiness companies (read
foreign financial institutes and international bankers) and the IT hardware
units. All benefit would have accrued to these companies in the name
of farmers. In fact, these two sectors, along with biotechnology, were
being heavily subsidised in the name of efficiency and infrastructure
whereas the poor farmers were being divested of the their only source
of income - their meagre land holdings.
Andhra in reality
was fast turning into a BIMARU state (an euphemism for backward states).
Thousands of farmers were migrating every season looking for menial
jobs in the urban centres. Mofussil newspapers in the heartland of the
cyberstate - that's how Mr Naidu wanted the state to be called - were
full of advertisements inviting people to mortgage their gold and silver
belongings. Livestock deaths and the plight of dalits and other landless
and marginalised no longer adorned the headlines. Farmers were asked
not to produce more rice (the staple food) as the State had no place
to stock it. Farmers suicides had become so common that Mr Naidu had
actually sent team of psychetrists to convince them against taking their
own lives.
Believe it or not,
daily wage workers in AP can still be hired at a price that their counterparts
in Bihar would scoff at. And yet, the ignorent media despised the maverick
political leader Laloo Prashad Yadav for taking his state - Bihar -
to economic backwardness whereas Mr Naidu was showered by all kinds
of accolodes. Such was the extent and level of poverty that AP also
topped the country in the percentage of women entering prostitution
and trafficking. Mr Naidu on the other hand ignored the writing on the
wall and went about holding web conferences with his bureaucracy much
to the chagrin of the national media, which painted him as the poster
boy for economic reforms.
The Naidu model
has failed. It also means failure of the McKinsey's model of economic
development. To talk of 'Naidu Plus', as some economists have said,
indicates the level of arrogance among a school of economic thought
that refuses to see anything except the industry.
No wonder, newspapers
have already quoted the secretary general of the Federation of Indian
Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), Mr Amit Mitra as saying "economic
initiatives in the IT and services sector should be extended to the
rural areas and to such industries as food processing and rural industry".
Unfortunately, the industry refuses to accept that it was because of
its own over-indulgence that Mr Naidu paid a heavy price. In addition,
the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the newly emerging biotechnology
industry, were the beneficiaries of the state's largesse in the name
of improving agricultural productivity and enhancing rural incomes.
The new government has focused on agriculture but refuses to look for
the real causes behind farmers distress. All its efforts are directed
towards convincing the markets that sensex will not be allowed to slip
any further.
The tragedy is that
while the farmers have delivered their verdict, the economists and policy
makers are not willing to accept it. The nation is not only clueless
but doesnot even want to know how to resurrect agriculture and farming.
This is where the politico-economy equations have gone wrong, this is
where the Indian democracy has reached superficial heights. The CII
and FICCI have already ensured that their breed of economic thinkers
and supporters are in each political party. The tragedy therefore is
that the policy directions between the ruling party and the opposition
has blurred. Both follow the same economic prescriptions that have no
connection with the ground realities. The Congress-led coalition too
will easily fall into the trap of pushing for more economic reforms,
and provide the same direction for the agriculture sector that Mr Naidu
falsy banked upon.
The ground realities
are far removed from the rhetoric and the statistics that have bred
immunity against compassion. We are all part of a global food system,
which perpetuates poverty and deprivation. The food industry makes tall
claims of nutritious diet that it churs out, and millions are dying
of obesity and related problems. We make tall claims of improved technology
for agriculture by pushing stark realities of increasing indebtedness,
growing poverty, resulting human suffering and hunger from the public
glare. We are, therefore, in reality, the cause behind hunger and the
resulting farmers suicides. Behaving like an Ostrich is surely not going
to eclipse hunger and death from the politico-economic radar screens.
It requires policy
makers, agricultural scientists, academicians and even the civil society
groups to first accept the fundamental flaws that force farmers to the
gallows. And then it needs determination - both political and scientific
-- and there is no reason why farmers distress cannot be turned into
a scourge of the past. Economic gimmicks like announcing free electricity
and enhancing bank credit will otherwise continue to force farmers to
take the fatal route by drinking pesticides.
Devinder Sharma
is a New Delhi-based food and trade policy analyst. Among his recent
works include the book In the Famine Trap. Responses can be emailed
at: [email protected]