Srinagar: The All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) and Jammu Kashmir Kisan Tehreek (JKKT) held a conference in Srinagar on Thursday and reiterated that they will continue to support the local farmers, towards whom the authorities have been apathetic.

Dr Ashok Dhawale, the president of AIKS, said that they will support the struggle of people in Jammu and Kashmir especially the farmers, in their struggle for their rights. He said their rights have been violated in the last few years.

“In Jammu and Kashmir, apple farmers, paddy and saffron farmers and even dairy farmers are facing problems and dealing with crises due to the fall in prices of produce. We will raise their issues and intensify our protest unless the issues are resolved,” Dhawale said.

Dhawale is visiting Kashmir as part of a nationwide program to mobilise support for the upcoming country-wide stir. The farmers’ body, which has as many as 1.36 crore members in 25 states, said they will be launching rallies around state Raj Bhavans on November 26, the day which also marks the beginning of the farmers’ agitation in 2020.

The farm leader said there are four main demands of farmers, including a legally guaranteed Minimum Support Price (MSP), something Dhawale said, has been recommended by the National Commission on Farmers.

“We also want a complete debt waiver to farmers and agriculture workers. The previous governments led by VP Singh and Manmohan Singh had made similar waive-offs. So, why can’t the current government led by (Prime Minister) Modi do it when they have waived off loans worth Rs 11 lakh crores for a few corporates?” Dhawale argued.

He also said that neither the state government nor the central government has been able to provide any relief under Fasal Beema Yojana to any of the farmers who have faced losses due to natural disasters that he said should be done and also called for the withdrawal of draft Electricity Bill.

The farm leader expressed serious concerns over the problems faced by farmers, especially in the wake of increasing debts including in Jammu and Kashmir. “In the last eight years, as many as 1 lakh farmers have committed suicide, according to data from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB),” he added.

Thursday’s conference comes after AIKS, earlier in June, called for unity in the apple-growing regions of J&K, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand to fight the large-scale exploitation of apple farmers.

Mohammad Yousuf Tarigami of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) said that Kashmir’s struggling fruit Industry was a priority in the conference discussions as it has been facing a lot of problems due to official apathy. The former Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) from Kulgam hoped that the AIKS will continue to support the farmers from J&K in their struggle and link their demands with the nationwide struggle of farmers.

“Our economy will suffer major losses if the government does not support the industry. We have seen fewer concessions and faced more excesses. There are so many hurdles and restrictions imposed here by the authorities,” Tarigami said.

Apple is considered vital in the region, which is believed to provide a livelihood to over more than 7 lakh families and contributes 8% of the GDP of Jammu and Kashmir, according to the economic review of 2017-18. The apple farmers, however, have been facing distress due to the lack of remunerative prices.

According to JKKT, around 30% of the production gets wasted or spoiled at different stages due to the non-availability of storage facilities with small and middle farmers. Recently, the arterial Srinagar-Jammu national highway remained closed for days due to which fruit-loaded trucks were halted for days leading to losses worth crores of rupees.

Courtesy: Newsclick

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Apples dumped on the roadside in Pulwama

Farmers claim they are not even making enough money to transport apples

Top quality apples like ‘Delicious’ are being sold at prices as low as 10-20 Rupees a kg

These apples have never been seen in local markets before because their demand outside Kashmir is so high

Incidentally, this year saw a bumper yield of Apples in Kashmir

Details of the inhuman blockade can be read here and here.

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On August 16, protests of apple growers resumed in Himachal Pradesh after a 10-day ultimatum to the government by the apple growers did not bring a satisfactory response. The cultivators had issued the ultimatum on August 5, and now, the deadline has ended.

Harish Chauhan, convener of Saunkta Kisan Manch has announced that the organisation will start its jail bharo (court arrest) campaign from today August 17.

This development is a very important moment in the emergence of a more sustained movement of farmers and orchard owners in Himachal Pradesh. During the prolonged agitation of farmers, which continued for almost a year in 2020-21, the adverse impact of big business houses on farmers, and marketing of farm produce had emerged as perhaps the biggest issue. Now this issue is making waves in Himachal Pradesh in the context of its apple economy.

Himachal Pradesh has a border with all the three foremost states/regions of the farmers’ movement—Punjab, Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh. So, some impact of the movement had also reached this Himalayan state then also but this was not a very big impact. The visit of Rakesh Tikait, a prominent leader of farmers from Western UP, had helped to bring this movement to Himachal Pradesh but this was only a small beginning.

More recently, 27 farmer organizations in Himachal, with a prominent role of apple growers, had mobilized to raise several demands relating to apple orchards in particular. This Sanyukta Kisan Manch (SKM) had organised a protest on August 5, presenting several demands and said that a bigger protest movement will start after about ten days (after August 15) if these demands are not met. Just before this, things have heated up with complaints about the role of big business houses.

The recently voiced complaints of SKM and apple growers are actually not very different from the complaints voiced last year too at the time of the apple harvesting season by several apple growers and their representatives. However, at that time the apple growers were not so well mobilised, and so the complaint had not attracted so much attention.

The state government in the BJP-ruled state has propagated the growing role of big business houses in apple purchase in a very positive light, and had claimed credit for speeding up the process of giving No Objection Certificates (NOCs) so that big business houses could enter the trade and purchase system which the government said will result in the apple growers receiving a higher price. However, at the ground level things took a different turn and apple-growers started complaining about a lower opening price and arbitrary gradation of apples to deny them a fair price.

Similar complaints are being made more forcefully now. On August 14, Sanjay Chauhan, co-convener of SKM, said, “New opening prices announced now have made it clear that the government is working under pressure from Adani and other companies.”

Gaurav Bisht reported in The Hindustan Times on August 15, in a report titled ‘Apple growers dissatisfied with Adani Agri Fresh’s opening prices’ that, “Adani Agri Fresh is one of the biggest corporate buyers of apples in Himachal. It owns three controlled atmospheric pressure stores in Himachal Pradesh, including one in Sainj and another in Rohru. The markets had crashed drastically last year after Adani Agri Fresh opened its price.”

Providing more details this report states, “Last year, the Rs. 5,500 crore apple business, which mostly runs on the fee market model, was dealt a major setback right at the beginning of the season when the Adani group announced its opening price for A-grade premium quality apples at just Rs. 72 per kg, much lower than the Rs. 88 per kg it offered in 2020.”

With this year’s opening being around Rs. 76 for premium A-grade apples, the apple growers are angry that despite the all-round rise in production and packaging costs during the last two years as well as several adverse weather conditions, they may have to sell at prices lower than in 2020. They are also upset that the assurances given to them regarding a committee, also including their representatives, having a major say in determining price is not being honored in the right spirit. On August 16, the SKM pointed out that clearly the earlier assurances regarding giving a key role to this committee, to be headed by the Vice-Chancellor, University of Horticulture and Forestry, and expected to protect the interests of apple-growers, have not been kept. 

This is an, election year in Himachal Pradesh and the three main opposition parties – the Congress, the Aam Aadmi Party and the CPM – are all extending their support to apple-growers. They and the SKM also realize that now may be the most favorable time to convince or compel the government to accept most of their demands. Several other farmers are also agitated because of big losses from adverse weather conditions not being compensated adequately and lack of proper rehabilitation and compensation for those whose land has been taken over for various development projects, particularly four lane roads. Hence it appears quite likely that the protest actions of apple growers and other farmers will escalate in the coming days till their demands are substantially met.

*Views expressed are the author’s own. The writer is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now.

Other articles by Bharat Dogra:

80th Anniversary of Quit India Movement

Why the Struggle of Dhinkia Deserves Wide Support

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