New farm laws historic, allow farmers to sell their produce even to private traders: Jitendra Singh

He said that during the last 6 years of Modi government, a number of historic steps were taken for welfare of farmers and there was a steady hike in MSP for helping in doubling their income. Singh said the committees will purchase Kharif and Rabi crops as usual, but the only difference is that a farmer can sell his produce also outside their areas now and even to private traders.

Terming the new farm laws historic, Union minister Jitendra Singh on Wednesday said that farmers have been liberated from the shackles of middlemen and can now sell their produce to private traders as well. Interacting with sarpanches, Block Development Council (BDC) chairmen and local activists of the peripheral hill districts of Doda, Reasi, Ramban and Kishtwar in Jammu and Kashmir on the new agricultural laws, he said that the Minimum Support Price (MSP) and APMC (Agricultural Produce & Livestock Market Committee) will continue and will never be removed at any cost. Hailing the move to eliminate middlemen through the new laws, the minister said that it was this class which was eating the income of the farmers and coming in the way of their progress, according to an official statement. Singh, the minister of state for personnel, said that after 70 years of independence, the farmers were liberated from the shackles of middlemen and now the farmers can choose where to sell and whom to sell and thus will become producers and traders. He said that during the last 6 years of Modi government, a number of historic steps were taken for welfare of farmers and there was a steady hike in MSP for helping in doubling their income.

Singh said the committees will purchase Kharif and Rabi crops as usual, but the only difference is that a farmer can sell his produce also outside their areas now and even to private traders. He can do so anywhere, within the state and outside and the state governments cannot levy any fee on farmers for that, the minister said. Singh said that a farmer can now sign agreements with agri-business companies and keep stocks beyond present limits, which is truly a historic measure. He said that some vested interests are spreading myths about their abolition, which need to be countered at all levels. Singh said, the arrival of Kharif marketing season 2020-21 has just begun and the government continues to procure Kharif 2020-21 crops at MSP from farmers as per its existing MSP schemes as done in previous seasons, the statement said. He said, only two days back, National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), the apex financing organization of Union Agriculture Ministry has sanctioned as first installment, funds amounting to Rs 19,444 crore to the states of Chhattisgarh, Haryana and Telangana for Kharif paddy procurement under MSP operations.

Singh appealed to party colleagues to reach out to each and every farmer in every village and explain to him the big conspiracy being hatched against him. This, he said, will enable the agricultural community to avail of the enormous welfare initiatives introduced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

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