SKM takes U-turn, ready to send names for Centre's MSP panel

New Delhi: The Samyukt Kisan Morcha has agreed to participate in the proposed committee on Minimum Support Price to be formed by the government which will discuss making the MSP more effective for farmers. The government had asked for three names of farmer leaders from the SKM faction who will be part of the committee.

Initially, the Kisan Morcha had refused to give names for the committee and asked the government for more clarity on the formation of the committee and the participants in it. After getting no response to the queries sent twice in writing, the SKM leaders are now discussing to proceed further and will decide on the three names in a meeting of farmer unions likely to be held in New Delhi by the end of this month.

"The government has asked us to give the names of three representatives from our side which we will decide soon. We had asked them what will be the terms of reference of this committee and the rights as well. Whether the recommendations of this committee will be brought to action or not and who else will be part of the committee. We wrote to them twice but they did not reply, however, we will see to it. MSP is the foremost issue today for farmers across the country. We at SKM are already discussing our next step on pending issues and one more meeting will be held in May to take some decisions" said Ashok Dhawale, core group member of the SKM.

The proposed committee on MSP will have representatives from the Central government, state governments, Farmer Unions, Agriculture scientists, and Agro Economists. The Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar last month said that the committee will be formed as soon as they get names from farmer unions. In fact, farmer leader Yudhveer Singh who is also one of the members of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha Coordination Committee received a call from the Agriculture Secretary on the 22nd of March in which he was asked to give the names of two-three leaders from SKM for the committee to be constituted by the Government of India.

But the SKM refused to send any names before their queries were addressed by the government and sent them twice in writing but their emails remain unanswered to date. It is also expected that the next meeting of Samyukt Kisan Morcha will be decisive for the farmer leaders suspended from the conglomerate for participating in electoral politics.

According to Ashok Dhawale, 16 out of 22 farmer unions from Punjab who went on to form Samyukt Samaj Morcha and contested elections have already announced that they have dissociated themselves from the political outfit and expressed their willingness to get back to the movement led by SKM.
"Rest of the five-six organizations are also expected to follow the same route. Our unity is intact and we will discuss re-inducting these farmer unions in our next meeting," added the SKM leader.