Krishna to lead delegation to Delhi

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, NOV. 24. The Chief Minister, Mr. S.M.Krishna, will be leading an all-party delegation to Delhi on November 28 to urge the Centre to take steps to stem the fall in the prices of agricultural produce.

Mr. Krishna made the announcement about his leading the delegation in the Legislative Assembly today after making a prepared statement on the subject. The delegation would meet the Union Agriculture Minister, Mr. Nitish Kumar, and others concerned.

After explaining the short term measures taken by the Government to steady the prices, Mr. Krishna said there were other long-term issues. He noted that under the World Trade Organisation agreement, agriculture too had come under international market mechanism. There was a view that the WTO was responsible for the fall in the prices of farm produce. Even some of his own Ministers were concerned over the implications of the WTO regime, he added.

The Chief Minister noted that Karnataka was the first State to set up a cell headed by a retired senior official with the Food and Agriculture Organisation, Dr. Premnath, to study the implications of the WTO agreement. The committee had already prepared a draft report. The Government would urge the Centre to act on the final report of the committee and protect the interests of the farmers.

As regards the steps to be taken to mitigate the current hardship of the farmers, Mr. Krishna said that a Rs. 75- crore revolving fund was going to be set up. While the Government would contribute Rs. 25 crores, the various agricultural produce marketing committees would contribute Rs. 50 crores. The corpus would be increased later to Rs. 100 crores. It would help the Government take up market intervention programmes. He assured the House that the Government was not sparing any effort to ensure remunerative prices to the farmers. He expected the price situation to improve once demands from the other States were received for the crops grown in the State.

Later the Agriculture Minister, Mr. T.B.Jayachandra, noted that the support price system did not cover horticultural crops such as coconut, arecanut and vegetables. About the WTO, he noted that India was one of the original signatories to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) of 1948. There was a misconception that India agreed to be part of the international price mechanism only from 1991.

The reply given by the Chief Minister and the Agriculture Minister failed to satisfy the BJP members who walked out of the House alleging that the Government was blaming the Centre disowning its responsibility.

In his written reply, Mr. Krishna attributed the fall in prices to extension of cultivation on account of good rainfall. The kharif crop covered 68.88 lakh hectares. Sowing was extensive and, in particular, the area under paddy, toor dal, maize and groundnut had increased. There was a slight decrease in the area under jowar. Last year's drop in the prices of oilseeds affected cultivation this year.

Mr. Shivanand Patil (BJP) spoke of the raw deal received by growers of jowar. The minimum support price for it should be increased from Rs. 445 to Rs. 600 a quintal.

Mr. M.S.Atmananda (Congress-I) demanded price support for jaggery.

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