‘Of India’s 13 cr farmers, only 750 protesting at Shambhu’

Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday said the BJP government in Haryana had been engaging with protesting farmers who were sitting on the Punjab and Haryana border at Shambhu.

Listing measures taken by the BJP-led NDA dispensation to raise farmers’ incomes, Shah said India had nearly 13 crore farmers, of which about 750 were sitting on the border at Shambhu. “About 750 of 13 crore farmers are sitting on the border. If you call this unrest, I do not know what to say. Ours is a farmer-friendly government. We have done record procurement at MSP,” he said.

He was responding to a Tribune query on the sidelines of a press conference on the first 100 days of Narendra Modi-led NDA 3.0. Shah said the government could also have taken the easy and populist path as the Congress-led UPA by granting a one-time loan waiver to farmers, but it chose to hit at the source of the problem.

“We calculated input costs which small farmers with 2.5 acre land incurred during the farming cycle and arrived at a figure of Rs 5,800. It was based on this figure that PM Kisan Samman Nidhi was rolled out to offer cash support of Rs 6,000 annually into bank accounts of small farmers,” Shah said, adding that 82% small farmers of the country do not need to take loans due to cash support.

He added that the government had done record procurement at MSP. “Our procurement rate is 120%, as opposed to UPA’s 30%. MSP for kharif crops for 2024-25 has been increased,” he said. Farmers agitating at Shambhu border have been demanding legal backing for MSP.