Suicides protests mount in Punjab's fields

CHANDIGARH: Punjab, the wheat bowl of the country, is smouldering with farmer resentment.

Farmers are not bringing their produce to markets for procurement by official agencies to protest against the Centre’s decision to import wheat at Rs900 per quintal while paying a paltry Minimum Support Price (MSP) of Rs650 per quintal to them.

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh would be calling on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday to demand higher minimum support price.
As many as seven farmers’ organisations joined hands to observe a two-day strike which derailed the procurement process that had started gathering momentum last week.

The largest grain market in Khanna town recorded arrival of 15,000 quintals of wheat on Tuesday as compared to 90,000 quintals received on Sunday. Bhartiya Kisan Union president Pishora Singh  told DNA that farmers in Punjab were not being paid their due, while the Centre was restoring to indiscriminate import of wheat in a state which had been contributing 70 per cent of its stocks to the FCI for national consumption.

He said in the event of the government’s failure to give remunerative price to farmers, the wheat stocks will find their way into the hands of private buyers.

For the first time in recent years, private buyers, including couple of MNCs, have captured the wheat market in Punjab hoping that wheat price would shoot up in days to come.

They are believed to have already cornered 70 per cent of the wheat arrivals in the state markets, whereas last year during the corresponding period, their market share stood at a paltry eight per cent.

He said the main reason for the private buyers’ spectacular success has been that they offered far higher prices to farmers than the MSP.