All India Kisan Sabha Press Statement

on 16 February 2009

The Finance Minister who presented the vote-on-account for the fiscal year 2009-10 has shown utter disregard to the needs of the millions of peasants, agriculture workers and toiling masses whose problems have only been accentuated under the dual impact of the agrarian crisis and the present global economic crisis. On the contrary the Government has taken refuge in vacuous statements like ‘India is the second fastest growing economy in the world’ without proposing anything concrete to resolve the problems.

The “Aam Aadmi” Government has not bothered to take note of the agrarian crisis, the food crisis, unemployment and increasing prices under which the masses are reeling. It is shocking that the real import of the global economic crisis has not dawned on our policy makers and even as there are media-driven talks of bail-outs for the corporate sector, there are no bail-outs for the “Aam Aadmi”.

The universalisation of the Public Distribution System and a comprehensive public health system which are indispensable for ensuring better standards of living and providing relief to the poor have been ignored contemptuously. Claims of encouraging/record food production are ironically accompanied by steep cut of 73 % in the allocation of food grains to the States under the APL category. Employment generation and rural development has taken a backseat. In times of falling prices for cotton, coffee, rubber and many other crops the Government’s attitude is only pushing peasants and agricultural workers into indebtedness and acute distress. In the context of the global economic crisis, the failure to link the NREGA to rural infrastructure development (including irrigational infrastructure), absence of any emphasis on increase in public investment in agriculture, rural development and social sectors coupled with the insensitivity to the insecurities of workers and farmers threatened by lay offs and price crashes has only exposed the true character of the UPA Government.

The skepticism about the much-hyped Loan Waiver Scheme, which according to the Finance Minister has benefited 36 million farm households, has also turned true. Of the 89.33 million farm households in India nearly 43.42 million farm households are indebted. Small and Marginal Farmers constitute 83.8% of the farm households and of them 46.28% are indebted. A large section hence still remains untouched by the loan waiver. These figures speak louder than words about the inadequacy of the Scheme. The Loan Waiver Scheme has also not addressed the loans from informal sources. However, the present Budget makes no mention of the issue of indebtedness.