14 Years Ago Bihar Abolished APMC System, Now Its Farmers Are Poorest In India

Expressing reservations over the recently enacted three farm laws, farmers are staging demonstrations since past 10 days at Delhi borders.

Many farmer organisations have alleged that the government wants to end the Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC) in the country in a bid to privatise agriculture like it was done in Bihar in 2006.

So let's look at the numbers if concerns of agitating farmers are genuine or not and whether farmers of Bihar have actually benefited from new agriculture laws in the last 14 years.

The latest figures released by the Lok Sabha this year related to the income of agriculture households in the country shows if any farmer has the lowest income in the country, then it is Bihar's farmer, who earns only Rs 45,317 annually. It is also important to mention here that perhaps this is why the richest farmer in the country, who comes from the state of Punjab, is leading the protest, fearing otherwise that he might also end up similar to his Bihar counterpart. A farmer in Punjab earns Rs 2,30,905 annually.

There is also a lot of debt on a Bihar farmer as compared to his income. According to the 2015-16 data of the Ministry of Agriculture, every Bihar farmer has a debt of Rs 19,672. Technically, he owes a little less than half of the money, which he earns through working throughout the year.  

Apart from this, although the central government does not have the data related to the latest picture of the rural economy, the old existing figures are also very disappointing. According to the National Sample Survey, even today, a person spends only Rs 1,430 in a month in the villages of the country.

Condition is very bad in many states and particularly in Bihar, wherein villages, one person lives in Rs 1,127 every month, i.e., Rs 37 per day for survival.  

If we talk about farming itself, then Bihar has 45.67 lakh hectares of irrigated land, and in Punjab, it is a little less, about 42 lakh hectares of irrigated land but when it comes to production, then the farmer of Bihar does not stand anywhere before the farmer of Punjab. For example, in Punjab, about 18% of the country's wheat grows, only 5.76 % in Bihar.

Similarly, in other crops also, the data show how Bihar is trailing in production, which indicates how farming has become a loss-making deal in Bihar. Perhaps due to all these apprehensions, the well-to-do farmers of Punjab, Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh are also participating in the movement. It is obvious that the pressure is now on the government as to how it will address the grievances of the farmers.