Livelihood of the tillers will be secured only under workers’ and peasants’ rule

As Finance Minister Chidambaram starts his pre-budget consultations, peasant organizations across the country are demanding several immediate steps for ensuring them a secure livelihood and fundamental changes in agricultural policy. They are demanding that their voices be heard and their concerns be addressed in the forthcoming budget.

Finance Minister Chidambaram has had just one meeting with so-called farmers’ representatives, who were handpicked by his party. On the other hand, he has started a series of meetings with the spokesmen of the big capitalists, such as CII and FICCI. He has already promised the big bourgeoisie myriad concessions and enabling policies in the forthcoming budget to be presented in February.

The UPA Government assumed power promising to address the problems of peasants and the rural masses. Facts show that it is in fact carrying out the bidding of the big bourgeoisie. Peasants have been demanding that the government should provide support prices for all crops in all regions of the country. It must establish a network of procurement centres for buying the produce of peasants. The Central Government has done exactly the opposite, both under NDA and under UPA. It has adopted the policy of curtailing public procurement and opening up the agricultural market to private sharks. It is insisting that state governments must amend their Agricultural Produce Marketing Regulations Acts, so that Reliance, Walmart and other capitalist monopolies can more easily secure their ‘supply chains’ by enslaving the peasants.

With rising prices of inputs such as diesel for pumps, electricity, water user charges, transportation, seeds and fertilizer, peasants have been demanding state assured supply of agricultural inputs at affordable rates. The Central Government is refusing to fulfill this demand, claiming it would cost too much money. However, it has no qualms about handing out thousands of crores of rupees every year to the big capitalist corporations as tax waivers, export concessions, “bad debt” writeoffs, and in other forms. According to recent finance ministry estimates, the tax exemptions and concessions cost the general public a phenomenal amount of Rs 1,00,147 crore this year. This is expected to rise further as the so-called Special Economic Zones expand.

Peasants’ organisations demand that a simple interest of at most 4% should be charged on all kinds of agriculture loans. They are also demanding that all types of risks should be covered under crop insurance and the insurance scheme should cover all crops. In opposition to what the peasants are demanding, the Central Government is opening up the banking and insurance sectors to the biggest financial monopolies, Indian and international. Bank credit is being increasingly subordinated to the drive of the monopolies for maximum profit from lending activity.

Peasants have expressed grave concerns over the government’s reluctance in making adequate investment in the agriculture sector. They have demanded that irrigation projects should be given top priority, with due attention to ecological concerns and the problems of project-displaced people.

Peasants are vehemently opposing the conversion of farmland for different projects, particularly for special economic zones (SEZs). They have called for scrapping the outdated Land Acquisition Act, using which various state governments have been taking over agricultural land and handing it over to the big capitalists.

In several areas in India, peasants have suffered heavily due to the failure of Bt Cotton, and they are demanding compensation from Monsanto, the agricultural multinational, for selling the seeds at a high price and giving false claims. They are demanding that the government should encourage organic farming which is environment and farmer-friendly by making special provisions in the budget.

Peasants have also demanded that peasant rights over seeds should be guaranteed in the proposed Seeds Bill. They have expressed concern over the new Food Standards and Safety Act which is likely to displace small vendors and fresh fruits and vegetables from the market, in favour of the agri-processing monopolies.

The deaf ear offered by the Finance Minister to the legitimate demands of peasants shows that the UPA Government is a government of the big capitalists, just like the previous NDA Government. It is not a government that wants to solve the problems of the peasantry.

The continuing suicides among peasants even after loan and interest waivers by the government has proved that giving some “relief” to the peasants while letting the forces of capitalism play havoc with their lives is no solution. It is like applying a soothing ointment on a cancerous wound that is eating into their bones.

Peasants cannot afford to trust these governments of big capital. They must rely on their own fighting unity, and on their unity with the working class.

It is only by establishing workers’ and peasants’ rule can the right of peasants to secure livelihood and prosperity be assured. The working class, in alliance with the toiling peasants, is that political force that can reorient the Indian economy to serve those who toil.

With political power in their hands, the working class and peasantry can expand the area under crops, and also invest in creating cold storage and food processing units in the countryside. They can reduce the huge wastage of agricultural products that takes place at present – for the benefit of the peasants and the workers. At the same time, they can prevent the giant capitalist corporations from gaining control of agricultural trade and from grabbing more land. They can achieve this by nationalizing wholesale trade and giving no space for private middlemen to fleece both producers and consumers.

A workers’ and peasants’ power will replace the colonial Land Acquisition Act with a new fundamental law that will not permit cultivable land to be sold to any private party under any pretext. The fundamental law will also ensure that the rights of labour, and the rights of a human being, cannot be violated under any pretext.