legislation . “ This is one of the biggest demands today . Committees have been set up and some private members ’ Bills were also moved but there has been no forward movement on enacting a Central legislation for wages of agricultural workers ,” he said .
Uncaring governments
Frontline spoke to a cross section of the participants . Suresh Paswan , an agricultural worker from Begusarai , Bihar , said they get paid anywhere between Rs . 100-150 as daily wages if there was work available . “ Bihar has 22 lakh acres and an equal number of agricultural workers . The Nitish Kumar government did not do anything about the report on land reforms whereby we were supposed to be given pattas ,” he said . He was referring to the D . Bandopadhyay report on Bihar ’ s land reforms . Paswan , who is associated with the Agricultural Workers Union , said that in Pipra Dodraj Panchayat , 500 families of landless workers were settled in homesteads from 2010-12 but in 2019 , a bulldozer uprooted all the families . “ The land is lying just like that . The zamindar cultivates it ,” he said .
Sanjay Shri Rajat from Madhepura had a similar tale . “ We don ’ t get 100 days of work ,” he said . “ In MGNREGA , JCB machines are used instead of human labour . The Central government talks big and makes tall promises . There are no factories where we can get work . Kadwa tel ( mustard oil ) sells at Rs . 200 a litre . Kya khaaye , kya bachaaye ? [ what shall we eat ; what do we save ?].”
Brajesh , a farmer from Ghaziabad had a different concern . He said that if the government did not declare a Minimum Support Price and guaranteeassured procurement , farmers would stop producing . “ The government gives us Rs . 2,000 and takes Rs . 20,000 from us ,” he said , referring to the dole given under the PM Kisan Yojana . This amount was meaningless as the costs of fertilizers and gas cylinders had gone up . He said one kilogram of potash sold at Rs . 700 a kg seven years ago , but now it was 18
Rs . 1,700 . Gas cylinder rates had likewise gone up to Rs . 1,130 , he said .
Karamveer Singh , a farmer from Aligarh , complained that fertilizer supplies at government cooperative societies were never available on time . There was black marketing , too , he claimed . In several rabi-producing States like Madhya Pradesh , Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh , fertilizer shortages were reported . “ Our entire family labour engages in agricultural operations . We take loans . If a farmer does not get the rate for his crops , the loans the bank give us against the Kisan Credit Card are useless as the interest rates are high . What use is the Rs . 2,000 in the face of so much inflation ?” Singh said .
He claimed that there was no difference between the khet mazdoor ( agricultural worker ) and the kisan ( farmer ). The average land holding that farmers had was between 1 and 2 hectares , he said , which in fact approximated the national average of the size of land holdings in India as per the Agriculture Census . “ We are as good as agricultural labourers . Farming and agriculture alone does not meet even our basic expenses .
Everything is private today ; health , education ,” he said . Sugarcane Farmers ’ Demands
Sugarcane farmers had their own woes . They complained that the Central government had increased the Fair and Remunerative Price for sugarcane only by Rs . 70 in the last four years . They said the government ought to fix a price of Rs . 500 per quintal or Rs . 5,000 a tonne as input costs had gone up . At present , the FRP was Rs . 2,820 a tonne . Balwant Singh , a sugarcane farmer and a Kisan Sabha leader from Haryana , said that the sugar mills always defaulted on payments . “ Only when we agitate are the payments made . There are cooperative sugar mills but there are plans to hand them over to private players ,” he told Frontline .
Much of the mainstream media seem to have ignored the large rally . “ If it is a politician ’ s speech , especially of the ruling government , the TV channels would carry the news the whole day . They have no time for us ,” said Parveena , the ICDS worker from Kulgam . “ But we will come again and again if the government doesn ’ t listen to us .” Courtesy with ‘ Frontline ’, May 5 , 2023
For Understanding
Our country , India is one of the biggest countries and one of the ancient civilizations of the world inhabited by more than a hundred crores of people , who have rich revolutionary traditions and a glorious heritage and culture . It is the country of many nationalities , multi-ethnic , multi-lingual and multi-religious .
Besides , caste division remains a historically determined ugly , inhuman and unique feature of Indian society .
The free and sovereign land of ours was transformed into a colonial country by the British imperialists . The Indian people were under the subjugation of this imperialist power for nearly two centuries .
In order to consolidate their rule , the colonial rulers created a new parasitic intermediary class of landlords through permanent settlement and ryotwari systems . In the process it was mostly the highly powerful and wealthy higher caste people who became the beneficiaries and provided a strong support base to the colonial rule . They retained and utilized the caste system – a bane of Indian society . To safe guard their colonial rule they resorted to communal divide of the people that in the end led to the partition of our country . They crushed the emerging capitalist productive forces and paved the way for the emergence of a new class , the comprador class .
But our people never reconciled to live in subjugation . They rose in struggles , revolts and uprisings to free themselves from the yoke of colonialism . Armed struggle played a distinctive role in the national liberation struggle . A protracted independence struggle was waged in the country . And the First War of Indepeddence-1857-shook the very foundations of the British Colonial Rule .
Class Struggle