MP claims agrarian success, reality points to the opposite

A leader in green revolution. Recognised time and again. There was no way the advertisement could have escaped the reader’s attention. It was the jacket. The flamboyant advertisement went on to say the following:

*The first state of India with 18% + Agricultural growth rate

* No 2 State in total production of wheat category (sic) surpassing Punjab, Haryana

* No 1 state in production of pulses, oilseed, gram and lentil

* More than 500 per cent rise in canal irrigation over a decade

The astounding ‘feel-good’ claims have been greeting newspaper readers in Madhya Pradesh in advertisements released by the state government. The other set of ‘news’ or ‘truth’ (playing on the old, Soviet era joke that Pravda was not Izvestia and Izvestia was not Pravda - Truth was not News/News was not the Truth) confronted readers on news pages.

The news reports spoke of farmers receiving peanuts as price for their produce. They reported on farmers getting together to enforce the ‘Gaon Bandh’ and prevent villagers from supplying vegetables, grains and milk to the middlemen and stop the produce from reaching cities. The news pages devote considerable attention and space to the 10-day agitation (June 1-10) to commemorate the killing of six farmers in police firing on June 6 last year near Mandsaur.

The news pages also report that the agitation had received a mixed response with a decline in supplies and rise in prices but farmers, largely unorganised, unable to enforce the restrictions.

The government’s credibility took a hit following its flip-flops on the issue. After farmers announced their plan, the state government tried to clamp down on them. Farmers were forced to fill bonds under section 107 of the CrPC pledging to maintain peace. Following widespread rumour that the state government was planning to instigate violence and then hold the farmers responsible forced Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan to hastily cancel the order. It had already sent a wrong signal to farmers.

While the BJP government squarely blames political rivals, notably the Congress, for instigating farmers, it was ironically the RSS-affiliate Bharatiya Kisan Sangh which was at the forefront in airing grievances of the farm sector. The state government had stopped Rahul Gandhi from reaching Mandsaur last year following the police firing on farmers. But this year when the Congress president declared plans to hold a rally of farmers, the state government had run out of excuses to deny permission. It could not have said that after one year, the situation was still volatile and not conducive for people to gather.

However, it was the BKS which in December, 2010 had led thousands of farmers from across the state to lay a siege at the Chief Minister’s residence and hold the state capital to ransom and register protests against the BJP government’s anti-farmer policies. Procurement-related wrangles and nexus between middlemen and marketing officials forced the BKS to build up a three-week agitation a couple of months later. Police firing during the agitation had then led to the death of a BJP leader.

The fact that an RSS-backed organisation outdid the opposition and caused the death of a party member embarrassed the government. It engineered a split in the BKS and the faction supporting the government called off the strike. The Kisan Sangh disowned its president Shiv Kumar Sharma. He remained with the RSS for some more time. Governmental ineptitude revisited Mandsaur last year. The BKS led by Shivkant Dikshit and Bharatiya Kisan Mazdoor Sangh led by Shivkumar Sharma again squared up and predictably enough the government engaged Dikshit in negotiations and the faction called off the strike. The other faction stayed put and the agitation took a violent turn. Chouhan said the farmers could never be violent. He claimed that videos proved Congress workers’ involvement.

The government then sought to exploit the other globally-known image of Mandsaur - as India’s opium production hub. Nearly 600 farmers were named for various crimes. It drew up a list of 32 opium smugglers with cases under Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS).

Most startling was the case of Kanhaiyya Patidar, whose family received a compensation of Rs one crore for his death in police firing. Kanhaiyya Patidar was posthumously declared an opium smuggler.

The government initially claimed the police did not fire on the agitators. With astonishing precision and videos, it sought to record the presence of smugglers and Congress members in the farmers’ rally. But, it failed to answer how only farmers were killed in the firing and not the miscreants or Congressmen, who allegedly indulged in violence. Long after the Mandsaur violence of June 6, 2017, the government failed to file any FIR against officials. But cases against agitators were pursued with vigour. Most curiously the report of Justice S K Jain Commission which was appointed to inquire into the matter has not been made public so far.