Farm sector organisations and activists on Tuesday said by claiming increased allocation for the farm sector in this year’s Budget, the Narednra Modi government was pulling off a “PR stunt”.

The amount allocated to the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare for its three departments appears to be ₹45,035 crore compared with ₹24,910 crore in 2015-16.

This is just 1.9 per cent of India’s Budget, they said in a joint statement, adding that the increase was “mainly because of the inclusion of interest subvention fund of ₹15,000 crore in this Ministry this year, up from ₹12,000 crore.”

This is plain jugglery with numbers, they said, adding that out of a total budget of around ₹36,000 crore for Department for Agriculture and Cooperation, crop insurance outlays of ₹5,500 crore, Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana of ₹5,400 crore, Krishi Unnati Yojana of ₹6,949 crore along with interest subvention adds up to ₹32,850 crore.

Kavitha Kuruganti, Convenor, Alliance for Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture, said: “A worrisome aspect is that disaster relief fund outlays have been kept very low. Farmers themselves have been asking for ₹10,000/acre.”

Kiran Vissa of Rythu Swarajya Vedika said: “There are no allocations for ensuring remunerative prices to farmers in terms of higher MSPs or Market Intervention Scheme or Market Stabilisation Fund. The Price Stabilization Fund is being used only to benefit consumers, not producers.”

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