Farmers protests against Farm Bill 2020
Farmers all over India called for BHARAT BAND on September 25, 2020. Hundreds of farmers are protesting against the Farm Bill that was passed on September 20, 2020. The bill is said to be ‘anti-farmer, anti-labor’ legislations.
The three bills under Farm Bill that were passed are:
The Farmers Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020
The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020
The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020.
The new system is supposed to eliminate the middlemen and sell directly to institutional buyers at prices to be agreed on.
The Indian government keeps saying that the introduced bill will give more freedom to farmers but the farmers believe that the bills are more inclined to big corporates and may face big challenges in the future. State governments are also worried that if private buyers start buying directly from farmers, they will lose out on taxes that are charged at APMC mandis. This may also lead scrapping of mandis, endangering the jobs of hundreds who work there.
