In Parliament: 18 months on, Central panel yet to come up with proposal on MSP

Sanjeev Singh Bariana

Chandigarh/New Delhi, Dec 12

The Centre’s committee on making Minimum Support Price (MSP) more effective and transparent, constituted nearly a year and a half back, is still “deliberating on the matter”, said Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Arjun Munda in reply to a question posed by MP Sukhbir Badal in the Lok Sabha today.

Meetings being held

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Meetings of the committee are being held on a regular basis to deliberate on the subject matters assigned to it. Arjun Munda, Agri Minister

Besides the MSP, the committee had been constituted to make suggestions on promoting natural farming and changing the crop pattern keeping in mind the changing needs of the population in the country. “The meetings of the committee are being held on a regular basis to deliberate on the subject matters assigned to it”, Minister Munda has replied.

Badal had posed a question, “Whether the commitment made to the agitating farmers last year after forming a committee on guaranteed MSP by the Union Government has been fulfilled so far?” Another question asked was as to whether the government had formed any timeline to fulfil the promises made to the farmers?

Minister Munda has replied, “The government constituted a committee in July 2022 consisting of representatives of farmers, Central Government and with adequate representation of state governments and eminent agriculture economists and scientists. Work is still under progress.”

In a separate question related to farmers, MP Manish Tewari says despite multiple assurances, the government had failed to make MSP a legal guarantee to the farmers. The minister has, “Each year, the government fixes MSP for 22 crops after also considering the views of state governments.”