Punjab CM opposes DBT for farmers

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh has opposed the Centre's scheme to make a direct online payment of the MSP to farmers' bank accounts, bypassing commission agents, for the crops to be procured by the government from the next Rabi season. Chief Minister Singh wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging him to ask the Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution to defer the implementation of the scheme for at least a year. 

CM  has also sought time from Prime Minister Modi for a meeting on the issue, the Punjab government said in an official statement. "The arhtiyas (commission agents) and farmers have long-standing relations," said the Punjab CM, questioning the need to change the system which, he claimed, was "working very well". "Around 50 per cent farmers give their land on contract, so how will those who till the land get their money under DBT?" Chief Minister Singh argued that arhtiyas are licensees under the Agriculture Produce Market Committee Act.

Claiming "an age-old relation between farmers and arhtiyas in Punjab," the chief minister said the farmers have never complained of non-receipt of MSP payment. The state government is ensuring online payment to farmers, albeit through these arhtiyas, he said.The chief minister said the land ownership and tenancy issues may give rise to various avoidable legal complications, especially during the ongoing farmers' agitation.

The Punjab chief minister has made the intervention in the wake of Punjab's arhtiyas association threatening to stop the procurement of wheat from next month as a mark of protest against the Centre's scheme of direct transfer of MSP to farmers' account. The association had claimed that the Centre was taking the step to target them for supporting the farmers' protest. The Centre had earlier directly issued a letter to get the accounts of farmers for the direct payment and now it is being done through FCI.