‘Communal forces are a threat to agriculture’

Days after Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi’s Uttar Pradesh Maha Yatra concluded, the Left-leaning All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) is also holding a nationwide rally from November 2 “against neo-liberal policies and communal forces”.

AIKS General Secretary and CPI(M) Polit Bureau member Hannan Mollah spoke to BusinessLine about trouble from Gau Rakshak Samitis in the agriculture sector, on identity politics ruining rural unity and on how cooperatives can help revive agriculture.

How different is the AIKS’s rally from that of the Congress’s Maha Yatra?

We are providing a voice for 80 per cent of the poor, middle- and lower-level farmers and agriculture workers. Rahul Gandhi was batting for rich farmers and big land owners. The Congress and the BJP are no different when dealing with the issues of farmers. This is the tenth year of the MS Swaminathan Committee report on Indian agriculture. The UPA did not implement the recommendations. The Narendra Modi government is also not keen to implement it.

This is the second such rally of the AIKS in a decade. How different is it from the 2006 rally?

The Narendra Modi government’s policies are pro corporate and against the peasantry and working class. The BJP promised remunerative price to all crops to the tune of 50 per cent in addition to the cost of production. Modi betrayed the poor peasants. They are not getting even the cost of production; on the other hand the cost of fertilizers, pesticides, diesel and power has increased manifold, along with the price rise in essential commodities.

Peasant suicides increased by 26 per cent in the last three years. Institutional loans are still not accessible to most of the farmers. PM Bima Yojana is just a farce. Irrigation facilities haven’t improved. Above all these, cutting down the funds for schemes like MGNREGA and the stubborn denial to wave farm loans have badly hit farmers. They have money to offer subsidies to corporate houses, amounting to ₹8 lakh-crore. Farm loans will be to the tune of ₹1 lakh crore. Also, the Ordinance on Land Acquisition and the decision to bring FDI and PPPs in agriculture is for corporatisation of agriculture has exposed the intention of the Centre.

How communalism is affecting the agriculture sector?

Look at the ‘Gau Rakshak Samitis’ . Twenty-five per cent of the farmers’ revenues come from livestock. Now there is an informal ban on the sale of cattle. Traders, fearing the criminal Gau Rakshak Samitis , do not want to buy, sell or trade cattle. Farmers are forced to abandon old cattle and stray cattle in villages have become a threat to the standing crop. This could even endanger the food security.

The RSS is trying to divide farmers in the name of religion and caste. They promote identity politics based on caste assertion. This is breaking the unity our villages. They are trying to change the food habits of Muslims, Christians, backward communities and Dalits. RSS chief openly supported gau rakshaks. Poor people engaged in the leather industry are also not spared. Thus, communalism is destroying our agriculture too.

What is the alternative you are suggesting?

We are for cooperative agriculture. There are a number of cooperatives in India. Most of them consist of with rich peasants and land owners. They should be democratised. The governments should support peasants to develop agro-processing industries and marketing network by changing petty production to large-scale production through peasant-worker cooperatives. Only under large-scale production can minimum wage could be ensured and convert wage labour into salaried modern farm worker.

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