SKM slams Agri ministry for surrendering funds
The SKM, which is an umbrella body that includes several farmers organisations and had led the farmers’ protests of 2020-21, referred to a report of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare titled “Accounts at a Glance for the Year 2022-23”, which revealed that the government has surrendered Rs.1,05,543.71 crore allocated for the ministry during the last five years since 2018-19
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The Samyukt Kisan Morcha has slammed the Centre, holding it responsible for betraying the farmers by surrendering funds allocated to the Agriculture Ministry.
In a statement, the SKM said over one lakh farmers committed suicide in 2014-22 as per the NCRB report and called on the farmers to “punish” the ruling BJP.
The SKM, which is an umbrella body that includes several farmers organisations and had led the farmers’ protests of 2020-21, referred to a report of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare titled “Accounts at a Glance for the Year 2022-23”, which revealed that the government has surrendered Rs.1,05,543.71 crore allocated for the ministry during the last five years since 2018-19.
“The BJP has promised freedom from indebtedness to the farmers in 2014 Lok Sabha election. The Modi government has written off Rs 14.56 lakh crores of arrears of the large corporate houses in the last ten years period. But not a single rupee of the farmers loan was waived,” the SKM said.
Citing the report of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) they said that 1,00,474 farmers have committed suicide under the reign of Prime Minister Narendra Modi between 2014-2022. “If the Modi gvernment has used the surrendered money for the farmers, many of the lives could have been saved,” they said.
“The farmers have also been demanding increased allocation for price support to ensure remunerative prices, agriculture infrastructure development, expansion of irrigation and for research and extension.
“SKM strongly condemns such a criminal act of betrayal of the interests of farmers of India. SKM flays the utter insensitivity of the BJP-RSS led government to the distressed farmers and the real intention behind this is to hand over agriculture to the corporates,” they said.
“SKM strongly protested the anti-farmer policies of the Union gvernment and appealed to the people to support the struggle to end corporate loot, save agriculture and save India. SKM calls on the farmers to punish BJP in order to protect the interest of farmers and the people at large,” they added.
According to the Agriculture Ministry’s report, the total allocation in 2018-19 for the Ministry of Agriculture was Rs 54,000 crore, of which Rs 21,043.75 crore was surrendered. In the subsequent years, Rs 34,517.7 crore (2019-20), Rs 23,824.53 crore (2020-21), Rs 5,152.6 crore (2021-22) and Rs 21,005.13 crore (2022-23) was surrendered by the ministry.
“This comes to a whopping total that is even more than the total allocation for agriculture in some of the years from 2018-19 to 2022-23,” they said.
The SKM added that the Standing Committee on Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Food Processing has also pointed out that the impact of such surrender of funds would adversely impact the north-eastern states, Scheduled Caste Sub Plan and Scheduled Tribe Sub Plan.
