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*MAIN ASPECTS OF FARMER LAWS AND WHY THEY ARE BEING DEMANDED TO BE REPEALED..A VERY THOROUGH ACADEMIC RESEARCH WORK (,2) OF NITYA LAW SOCIETY (NGO)...AN NGO FOUNDED BY ADV. CHARANJEET CHANDERPAL*
Section-7(2) of the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Act, 2020 specifically provides for unlimited storage of the essential commodities/farming produce.
Section-2 of the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 specifically provides for extraordinary price rise and no regulation for stock limit for Big Corporates and exporters from production of any agricultural produce in the field to final consumption.
Black Marketing and Hoarding means the unlimited storage coupled with uncontrolled extraordinary price rise. Therefore, the abovementioned Farmers Act, 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 specifically provide for Black Marketing and Hoarding.
Black Marketing and Hoarding is specifically prohibited under the Prevention of Black Marketing and Maintenance of Supplies of Essential Commodities Act, 1980 and this Act has not been repealed so far.
Likewise, Section-2(47)(v) of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 specifically prohibits the Hoarding of goods and the definition of “goods” under Section-2(21) says that food grains and farming produce are included in the definition of “goods”.
Similarly the National Food Security Act, 2013 prohibits the unlimited storage and extraordinary price rise to save the interests of eligible households of 75% of rural population and 50% of urban population. The said Act specifically provides for “Central Pool” of stock of food grains purchased at the “minimum support price” and delivered at the same price as maximum price as per Schedule-I of the National Food Security Act, 2013.
It is respectfully submitted that the Constitution of India does not empower the Parliament and the Central Government to enact an Act and frame the rules thereunder to provide for the Black Marketing and Hoarding in the form of unlimited storage and extraordinary price rise at the hands of private big corporates and exporters in the domestic market. This is prohibited under Art-21 of the Constitution of India and it affects the rights of citizens under Art-14 and 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India.
The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 specifically says that the Government shall remain a silent spectator in the event of extraordinary price rise on account of unlimited storage by the black marketeers and hoarders in the clothing of “value chain participant” or exporters or processors. It further says that there shall not be an order for regulating stock limit and these people shall have free hand to any agricultural product “from production of any agricultural produce to final consumption, involving processing, packaging, storage, transport and distribution, where at each stage value is added to the product”. Surprisingly value is being added even for storing and transporting an agricultural produce.
It is common knowledge that the Big Corporate Purchasers find ways to create shortage either by hoarding at the domestic level or exporting the maximum farming produce and thereafter they sell the same product at extraordinarily high prices and surprisingly the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 says that the Government shall keep its eyes closed and wait till there is “hundred per cent increase in the retail price of horticultural produce; or fifty per cent increase in the retail price of non-perishable agricultural foodstuffs” and the Government shall keep its eyes fully closed to any extraordinary price rise if the agricultural produce has been stored, transported, packaged, processed or distributed. The reasoning is that at each stage the value is added to the product.
Rule-13 of the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce Rules, 2020 provides for imposition of penalty on the farmers for recovery of the amount from Rs.50,000/- to Rs.10,00,000 and Rs.10,000/- for each day of contravention and FORM-3 under Rule-8(2) provides for Memorandum of Settlement in which the farmer can be divested of his land and produce both by the order of SDM likely to be playing at the hands of the Big Corporates for reasons known to everyone.
The bare perusal of the Farmers Acts ensures that a farmer shall not even get guaranteed minimum wages for working as a labourer and even working as a security guard of the agricultural area under contract farming. A farmer shall not be guaranteed even the minimum expenses met by him for the seeds, fertilizers, water, electricity, and diesel and the farming services he would be providing to a Big Corporate trader.
The Objects and Reasons of the Farmers Acts appear to benefit the bureaucrats and politicians through the big corporations in the States and at the Centre by way of funding to the political parties and no maximum limit is provided for the political funding and it is exempted from tax and the source of income is not to be disclosed.
The Scheme of the Farmers Acts, 2020 and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020 are silent about the minimum and maximum price structure of the agricultural produce. As a result thereof the same agricultural produce like any pharmaceutical product shall be having higher and lower prices depending on the brand, whereas a farming produce should be sold at a price the way a generic drug is sold in the market at actual price to protect the masses from exploitation of the Big Corporates.
If the Corporates are allowed to earn disproportionate profits from the sale of agricultural produce, there should be a mandatory clause in the agreement for contract farming for disbursement of proportionate profits to the farmers also in the form of equity shares of that company. The reason being that the Corporates at times shall be buying wheat at Re.1 per kg and cauliflower at Rs.5 per kg and they would be selling the same at the rate of Rs.50 per kg as and when the prices rise in the market. In the absence of any mandatory clause in this regard, a farmer shall not be getting any profit at all even though it is a Joint Venture of the farmer and the big corporate trader.
The concept of Joint Venture Partnership between the farmers and the big corporates is already there in the Objects and Reasons of the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Act, 2020. Therefore, a farmer is entitled to a share in the mutually agreed remunerative price framework in a fair and transparent manner.
The Farmers Acts, 2020 encourage formation of Cartels indulging in Hoarding and Black Marketing of the essential commodities by purchasing at dirt cheap rates and selling at skyrocketing prices.
