Pradeep Sharma, a UP potato farmer, scored a profit of just Rs 490 on 19 tonnes of produce.
New Delhi: The 19 tonnes of potatoes he harvested from his field fetched Uttar Pradesh farmer Pradeep Sharma all of Rs 2 lakh. After he factored in the expenses, it left him with a net profit of just Rs 490.
Frustrated, Sharma dispatched the sum as a “New Year’s gift” to Prime Minister Narendra Modi with a note: “Aap rakh lijiye (You can keep it)”.
Sharma’s “gift” comes as the NDA government at the Centre finds itself facing criticism that it doesn’t care about farmers.
Last year, two massive farmers’ protests shook the national capital, with demonstrations organised in other parts of the country as well, including Mumbai.
The farmers demanded a better minimum support price (MSP) and freedom from debt. Their plight went on to become a massive poll issue in the run-up to the assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh in 2018.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which heads the NDA, lost all three states, the loss primarily attributed to farmers’ disenchantment with the government’s policies.
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‘No relief’
For the last 25 years, Sharma and his family have been growing potatoes on his 15-acre farm near Agra.
While crop prices have never been a constant, in the last four years his suffering has been aggravated by near total financial loss, he told ThePrint. The last time he received relief from the government was in 2008-2009.
“Earlier, the losses were not so acute,” Sharma said “I have sold potatoes for Rs 5/kg too, but managed to get through.”
He said he had written to the Prime Minister about his “debilitating financial condition” in 2015 as well, but received no response.
“My loans amount to nearly Rs 32 lakh. While some farmers’ loans were waived in UP, I have never received a single penny from the government till date,” he said while lashing out at Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
In 2017, the UP government had decided to waive farm loans of up to Rs 1 lakh, but the execution has been marred by controversies.
“I have two sons. One is in Class 8, and the other is doing his BA (Bachelor of Arts),” Sharma told ThePrint. “My brother works for less than Rs 10,000 a month in Agra just so we can pay my elder son’s college fee.”
ThePrint tried to reach UP agriculture minister Surya Pratap Shahi and various other office-holders in the ministry for comment, but did not receive a response. This report will be updated as and when they respond.
The potato conundrum
Uttar Pradesh is India’s largest potato producer, accounting for 35 per cent of the country’s total harvest.
An increase in production over the last few years has led to a sharp decline in the value of potato. The UP government sought to intervene in 2017 by fixing the minimum support price for potato at Rs 4.87/kg, but this was dismissed as inadequate by farmers.
According to Alamgir, the general secretary of the Agra Potato Famers Committee, nearly 3 lakh tonnes of potatoes from last season remain in cold storage in western UP.
When Sharma attempted to sell his produce in the local market in December, he found no takers since the market was already overpopulated with others attempting to sell potatoes.
“I spent nearly Rs 2 lakh shipping my produce to Akola, Maharashtra, since no one in Agra wanted to buy potatoes,” he said. “After all the money I spent, I was left with just Rs 490. What good will that do? My family comprises 14 of us in total.”
“Wholesale price of potatoes is around 4-5 rupees a kg, but due to a surplus of production, no one wants to purchase more potatoes,” he told ThePrint.
The Agra Potato Farmers Committee wants the government to fix a minimum support price for potatoes, like they did with paddy last year.
Farmer leader B.M. Singh told ThePrint, “We flagged the anticipated costs and MSP during the two farmer protests in Delhi last year. Only if the government adopts the Swaminathan Commission report will farmers be able to increase their income.”
The Swaminathan Commission report suggests that MSP for farmers be fixed at 50 per cent more than the cost of production.
Sharma now believes his only option lies in selling off a part of his land since, he says, farming has become practically unfeasible under the present government.
“The only thing I can think of is selling the land. The least they can do is help me with that,” said Sharma.
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