Following Intensified Agitation, UP Government Cracks a Whip on Sugar Mills

With the general elections around the corner, the Yogi-led BJP government in Uttar Pradesh is doing all it can to make a last-ditch effort to win over the protesting sugarcane farmers. As PM Modi visited Gorakhpur on February 24 to launch the flagship Farmer’s Minimum Guarantee Scheme, the UP government has asked the state's private sugar mills to clear their cane arrears by Feb 28.

However, the move by the government is not in tandem with its actions. On February 4, sugarcane farmers from the Bijnor region of Western Uttar Pradesh were brutally lathi charged by the administration for asking for their due compensation. The farmers have gone ahead to state that they will self-immolate if their fair compensation is not given.

Farmers on the ground have been crumbling under debt, and therefore are staging regular agitations. Speaking to Newsclick, the farmers explained that to cultivate one acre of land, farmers end up spending Rs. 40,000-50,000 and the profit the mills make is approximately Rs. 60,000-70,000. However, the farmers are not given any returns by the mills.

Furthermore, as an overview of the situation of sugarcane production in the entire country, arrears to be paid to sugarcane farmers by the mills in the 2017-18 season has crossed Rs 23,000 crore.  UP accounts for almost half of it. Currently, the state mills of the UP owe almost Rs 10,000 crore to the farmers, amounting to almost half the total of outstanding amount by mills in India.

As on December 31, 2018, 501 operational sugar mills in the country had produced 110.52 lac tons of sugar. With the demand of sugar remaining stagnant, it has further depressed the sugar prices and increased the outstanding arrears. With the deepening crisis, the BJP [state] governments across the country are rushing into damage control mode.

DC Singh of the All India Kisan Working Committee (AIKWC) from Bulandshahr explained, “Some of the mills, because of our pressure, started paying the farmers their dues, however, the situation of the sugarcane farmers is extremely volatile. We have been seeing a trend that under electoral pressure, the government is offering token compensation packages from the government treasuries instead of cracking a whip on the nexus of the mills. The mills have been making unprecedented profits, and while the produce of the farmers is still being sold at Rs. 315/325 per quintal, the recovery rates have been stagnant.”

Discussing the issue further, Jaswinder Singh of the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) told Newsclick, “The biggest policy failure at the hands of the BJP government has been the fact that they have let the state governments take a call on the compensation that will be given to the farmers.”

In an attempt to appease its farmer support base, the Centre had announced, on Thursday, a seven per cent hike in the minimum selling price (MSP) of sugar from Rs 29/kg to Rs 31/kg.

Previously, in January this year, Uttar Pradesh appeared to have favoured a 12 per cent increase in the government-set floor price for the sweetener. However, it did not yield any gain. Instead, CM Yogi Adityanath had blamed the low international sugar prices and a lean export market for the purported crisis in the domestic sugar sector.

Also watch: Sugarcane Farmers Drown in Debt in Western UP