When Congress-led UPA rejected Swaminathan’s formula on MSP

Tribune News Service

Aditi Tandon

New Delhi, February 14

The Congress, which on Tuesday promised a legal guarantee to Minimum Support Price if voted to power in the upcoming General Election, had not accepted the MS Swaminathan formula on MSP calculation under its UPA regime.

Parliamentary records reveal that in an April 2010 answer in the Rajya Sabha to a related query, then Minister of State for Agriculture and Food KV Thomas had said that the MS Swaminathan Commission recommendations that the MSP should be at least 50 % more than the weighted average cost of production "has not been accepted by the Government."

Giving reasons for the rejection of the suggestion made by the Swaminathan-chaired National Commission on Farmers which gave its report under UPA II, Thomas said, "The National Commission on Farmers under the chairmanship of MS Swaminathan has recommended that the MSP should be at least 50 % more than the weighted average cost of production. This recommendation, however, has not been accepted by the government because MSP is recommended by the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices based on objective criteria and considering a variety of relevant factors. Hence prescribing an increase of at least 50% on cost may distort the market. A market linkage between MSP and cost of production may be counter-productive in some cases."

The answer was to a question by BJP MP Prakash Javadekar who had asked whether the government had accepted the recommendations of the Swaminathan Commission regarding calculation of remunerative prices to be paid to farmers.

The MSP formula recommended by MS Swaminathan was implemented after the BJP Government came to power in 2014.

BJP leaders on Wednesday asked why the Congress did not implement the Swaminathan Commission recommendations when it was in power.

The National Commission on Farmers submitted five reports through the period December 2004 and October 2006 under former PM Manmohan Singh.

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