35 meetings of MSP panel held, report awaited: Govt

New Delhi, December 5

Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Tomar on Tuesday informed the Lok Sabha that the government constituted panel on MSP regime has met 35 times and its report and recommendations were awaited.

Tomar was responding to a supplementary query on the minimum support price in the Lok Sabha by Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury.

Chowdhury wanted to know whether the government was thinking of legalising the MSP regime as demanded by farmers who had agitated against three agriculture reform legislations forcing their revocation in 2020.

Tomar said the BJP government was working to implement 200 of the 201 recommendations made by the MS Swaminathan Committee which presented its report in 2007. “One of the major recommendations was fixing MSP at 50 per cent profit over cost of production. The Congress was in power from 2007 to 2014 but did not implement this suggestion. It was implemented after PM Modi came in power in 2014. As against Rs 1 lakh crore spending on procurement on MSP under the Congress, today we are spending Rs 2.28 lakh crore,” he said.