Sugarcane farmers warn of protests over unpaid dues

Uttar Pradesh Kisan Mazdoor Morcha has warned the UP government of protests if the dues of sugarcane farmers were not cleared on time. VM Singh, the Rashtriya Kisan Majdoor Sangathan convenor in a letter to UP CM Yogi Adityanath also reminded of PM Modi's 2017 poll promise.

New Delhi: The Rashtriya Kisan Majdoor Sangathan has written to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath warning him of a protest by sugarcane farmers over unpaid dues. VM Singh, convener of the Sangathan, also reminded Yogi of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 2017 poll promise that payment to sugarcane farmers would be made in two weeks' time and that interest would be paid in case of non-payment. In the letter, Singh stated that protests will be held from July 6-12 at the offices of district magistrates, sub-divisional magistrates and tehsil offices, and on July 15, they will convene a protest at the cane commissioner's office.

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Singh said sugarcane farmers in the state had voted for the BJP with the hope that the new government would address their concerns and that their issues related to payments would be resolved. However, the assurances haven't seen the light of the day. The demands of the farmers include immediate payment of full arrears of the sugarcane year 2020-21, besides the demand for interest at the rate of 15% per annum on the arrears from 2011 till date.

Singh, in the letter, said the sugarcane farmers have been fighting for prices and interest for 26 years and that despite the orders of the Allahabad High Court, the interest of 15% per annum had not been given to the farmers on the delay in payment for the years 2011-15. He further said that in the last four years, the prices of diesel, pesticides, fertilizers, wages and electricity etc had increased continuously but sugarcane prices had seen only a marginal increase. According to the Sugarcane Institute of Uttar Pradesh, currently, the cost of sugarcane production is Rs 300 per quintal and the government has assured one-and-a-half times the cost to the farmers. As per this, the rate of sugarcane should be Rs 450 per quintal but farmers are being paid only Rs 315-325 per quintal for the last 4 years.

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Singh went onto say that the picture is more or less the same in Maharashtra and Haryana. The Haryana government has promised to make full payment of about Rs 420 crore dues of sugarcane farmers by July 10, while the dues of sugarcane farmers in Maharashtra peg at around Rs 4200 crore, he said.

India is the second-largest country in the world after Brazil in the production of sugar and also in terms of consumption. However, farmers engaged in sugarcane cultivation face trouble every year regarding payment from sugarcane mills. Despite all the tall claims of the government, the situation in sugarcane-dominated states is no different. The country's annual sugar production is worth Rs 80,000 crore, but the farmers do not reap benefits.

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Uttar Pradesh is the country's leader in the cultivation of sugarcane while Maharashtra and Karnataka stand at second and third positions respectively. Sugarcane is also cultivated in Tamil Nadu, Punjab and Haryana. Uttar Pradesh alone accounts for 51% of the total irrigated area in the country and 38% of the total sugar production comes from Uttar Pradesh. The Central Government had also constituted a high-level committee on the recommendation of NITI Aayog to resolve the payment crisis. However, the issue persists.