Bumper Problem

With low market prices and little help from the government,Rajasthan’s farmers, especially garlic producers, are in a financial mess in a good crop year.

- T.K.Rajalakshmi

RUMBLINGS OF DISCONTENT WERE PALPABLE in Kishanpura Takia in Kota district, Rajasthan. The village, with a population of 5,000, was holding on to its harvested garlic crop, refusing to take it to the mandi. Eighty per cent of the households had cultivated garlic, and stacks of garlic bulbs were stored in every house. The farmers refused to accept the minimum intervention price of Rs.3,200 a quintal announced by the State government on June 14. They said they would not settle for anything less than Rs.4,000 a quintal. They argued that the government offered Rs.3,200 for the best-quality garlic and that not all of the produce would be bought at that rate. Last year, one quintal of garlic fetched Rs.8,000.One farmer, SureshChand, told Frontline that they would hold on to the produce until November, hoping to get a better rate. “After that, the crop will begin to sprout and it will be of no use for us or the consumer,” he said.The farmers said they were not keenon deploying labour to clean the garlic as that would mean an additional cost. They would hold on to the crop until the government declared a price that covered the cost of production.

Anger had been growing as the government refused to intervene when prices crashed owing to a glut in the market. The Agriculture Minister had reportedly taunted farmers by saying that he had not asked them to bring huge swathes of land under garlic cultivation. Incidentally, garlic farmers had taken their crop to the Pipliya Agricultural Produce Marketing Centre at Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh, the epicentre of farmers’ unrest in that State. The other markets they approached were Neemuch (also inMadhya Pradesh) and Kota. Last year, one kilogram of garlic fetched Rs.105 at the Neemuch Agricultural Marketing Centre. This year, the Neemuch market offered Rs.40 for 1 kg of the crop.