The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Sat Nov 28, 2020 11:30 pm

crams wrote:
Sat Nov 28, 2020 5:39 pm
Must watch interview that India's premier woke libarandu elite, Burka Bibi conducted with a Khalistani. By Burka's standards, this was a no holes barred attack by her on terrorist Bhindranwale

https://twitter.com/i/status/1332711966893166593

Chetak et.al, if you listen to that Khalistani, he repeatedly says we are fighting for a 'federal structure'. And believe me, I don't have the clip, but I have heard none other another Lutyen favorite son, former amby K.C. Singh (who called for US ambassador to speak up against ModiJi for "lynching" of Muslims), also used the same phrase: 'strengthen federal structure' in an interview a while back on UnDy. And he never hides his feelings or words of contempt for RSS.

So my take is that this so called farmer protest needs to be handled very deftly by BJP govt. One cannot only dismiss it as only Pappu's slaves instigating the Punjab farmers. No doubt Pappu, Queen madam and their courtiers are, but at the core IMO, its a huge expressions of some imaginary grievance, dare I say hatred, that a large section of Sikhs have towards Hindus and a yearning for a separate identity. I don't believe vast majority of Sikhs want any Khalistan pipe dream, but that instinct of separateness does permeate in various strands across the Sikh populace.

Under the circumstances, I think it was a very wise and welcome move by Amit Shah to douse tempers and call for talks. This is In contrast to many RW on SM platforms who call to crush these protests. While surely these protests are not genuine and are manufactured, but given that Punjab is such a sensitive border state with a volatile and emotional population with a strained history, the last thing India needs is to lets this circus descend into a rest of India Vs Punjab tug of war

https://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/ ... r-3-667982

Finally, while this has the marking of CCA-2, one must keep in mind that CAA-1 was mostly Islamists + woke libarandus, as I say above, this one is different.
she was taken by surprise.

what he said was quite far removed from what she expected him to say. :mrgreen:

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by crams » Mon Nov 30, 2020 12:56 am

chetak wrote:
Sat Nov 28, 2020 11:30 pm

she was taken by surprise.

what he said was quite far removed from what she expected him to say. :mrgreen:
Indeed, she was trying her best to get him to put in a spin. But he was pretty blunt and honest and his articulation. But I see many others, for e.g., Gen Panag on his twitter line diss this guy as a lunatic fringe.

That brings me to the central issue. How much of these protests are genuine even if they are based on a flawed premise, and how many are opportunistic. Clearly Pappu &Co fall in the latter category. Needs some deft handling. We certainly don't want this to descend into chaos.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Aditya » Mon Nov 30, 2020 4:56 am

Amit Shah is inviting them for a talk but they don't want it. Clearly, the protest is not for farmer bills. It is totally politically motivated. They know that there are no other issues for fighting so they are using farmers. In farmers also there are lots of Khalistani people, They all are running this protest. I belong to Haryana, I talked to lots of farmers and they are happy with the bill. They are saying that under this bill they can directly sell crops to the government. They can sell it anywhere. This bill will help them to sell their crop without mediators. You can see CMO Haryana tried to call Punjab 13 times but he has not responded. In Delhi AAP and Congress also trying to use this protest for their political movement.

In my opinion, the Government should talk to them if they are ready otherwise they are going to create a new Shaheen Bagh in Delhi.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Aditya » Tue Dec 01, 2020 4:58 am

CAA was passed in November last year for Pakistani Hindu refugees. we have followed the story to see what changes came in their life but unfortunately, nothing has happened. They are still not getting electricity, water, and other services. the only thing they get the police is not torturing them like before. They are feeling sad because the Delhi government is providing electricity and water to Rohingyas but not for them. They are fighting for refugee cards as well as most Afganistan refugees have. They are saying that the Delhi government only stand with Muslims and offer jobs to them. we have done a follow-up story please see and let us know if you want to know anything more about them

here is the link

https://youtu.be/KdKq9Ackm64
[youtube]https://youtu.be/KdKq9Ackm64[/youtube]

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by crams » Tue Dec 01, 2020 4:16 pm

Well, well, well. It does seem farm protests are reaching a crescendo. I don't see any major damage yet. But for sure with Canadian PM issuing some BS statement, whit media taking notice, and above all, the 'farmers' (I deliberately put quotes, because I don't believe these protests are all by farmers alone) themselves taking a hard line and rejecting almost every proposal of govt except unconditional talks which govt has acceded to. As much as these 'farmers' are Indian and no harm in reaching out to them, but caving in to their brazen demands will set a bad precedent. Believe me p!ssfulls are watching these protests carefully as are Paki ISI (some of them are already embedded). So while talks are welcome, Indian govt cannot be seen to be buckling under pressure.

To get a measure of the thinking of ModiJi haters masquerading as 'experts' be it on foreign policy or the agriculture bill, please follow former amby K.C.Singh's twitter line. The guy has even endorsed Justin libarandu's gross interference in India's internal affairs.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 03, 2020 6:33 am

this instigated mob rampage is what should concern us as tax payers as also responsible citizens who always end up on the receiving end of protests by special interest groups because our normal lives are forcibly disrupted and our fundamental rights are so callously trampled upon every time.

those in three of the 5 pillars of our democracy, whose sworn duty it is to protect, inform and defend the citizenry and uphold their constitutional rights are nowhere to be found as they seem to be busy pandering to their political masters or even worse, covering their asses.



What Farmers Have Learnt From The Anti-CAA Protests: Blackmail Using Street Power Can Work


What Farmers Have Learnt From The Anti-CAA Protests: Blackmail Using Street Power Can Work


R Jagannathan
Dec 3, 2020

What Farmers Have Learnt From The Anti-CAA Protests: Blackmail Using Street Power Can Work



Image
Farmers protesting against new farm laws. (Representative image)


Snapshot
Mob protests and street violence will become the norm unless the police-investigative-judicial system is capable of handling them without excess violence.


Right now, the state lies prostrate while the mobs have the power to blackmail governments.

The disconnect between Dalal Street and Main Street could not be starker. The stock markets are celebrating the likely return of growth from this quarter onwards even as Delhi is battling both Covid-19 and thousands of farmers camped on its borders, where a deliberate effort is being made to scuttle the most important agricultural reforms undertaken by the Indian state ever.

If the Street wins this battle, Dalal Street will have nothing to celebrate. Every reform can be rolled back through mob action.

This is not to deny that farmers may have genuine concerns over what will happen to MSPs (minimum support prices) once the mandi system is forced to compete with large contract buyers of farm produce. Commonsense tells us that this competition among buyers can only benefit sellers, once the latter get organised. But the agitating farmers have been led up the garden path both by political parties and vested interests. If even half the efforts put into organising protests had been expended in organising farmers into strong producers’ outfits which can bargain on equal terms with contract buyers, MSPs would not even be needed.

But no. The protests are about using farmers’ anxieties to destabilise an elected government and its reforms agenda. The passive-aggressive protest method that was employed to devastating effect during the anti-CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) protests, from Jamia Millia to Shaheen Bagh, is now being used again to blackmail Delhi into kowtowing to the mob and repeal all the reform measures. If the Centre succumbs, this will become the norm in future protests where committed groups or communities will use street power to overawe the government into conceding their demands.

The anti-CAA and farmer protests have exposed the weak nature of the Indian state, where the only way it can combat mob blackmail is the use of excess force (lathi charge, teargas, even rubber bullets), which will then be used to create further protests till the government of the day caves in. What we are seeing is the threat to governance come repeatedly from mobs taking to the streets. If this continues, even the courts will not have the courage to tell what they said to the Shaheen Bagh protesters: protest in designated areas, but not in public places where the rights of ordinary citizens are trampled jupon. Mobocracy will win.


Whatever it does in the farmers’ case, the Narendra Modi government has to think through its future response to street-level blackmail.

It is interesting that the Supreme Court yesterday (2 December) directed the government to install CCTV cameras in all police stations and places where the probe agencies interrogate suspects and arrested people. While this is a good suggestion intended to prevent the use of third degree methods, one wonders why the same level of transparency cannot be brought to the courtrooms and judges’ chambers, where hearings and cases are recorded and can be rechecked for bias or bribery at a later date.


However, that is another story. What the Supreme Court has done is give the government an idea about how it must deal with future street-level blackmail tactics. Since protesters tend to use social media and doctored videos to make the police seem like initiators and perpetrators of violence – which could certainly be true in some cases – there is an equal need for policemen trying to prevent mobs from doing damage to present their own videos of what actually happened. It is not only police stations that should be provided CCTVs, but policemen and officers dealing with mob violence during protests must wear body cameras so that they too have a record of what really happened. In some US cities, bodycams are the norm for policemen; it is time India did the same.

Having cameras in police stations and on their person will ensure that both policemen and protesters behave properly. Both of them should know that what they say or do can be recorded and brought up as proof to explain why the police had to use force in a certain situation. Equally, protesters can question whether the police were too heavyhanded while dealing with relatively peaceful people.

Shaheen Bagh should have been cleared using body cams where patient policewomen physically moved the protesters out of public spaces and into designated areas where the dadis could not inconvenience the public. While it may be legitimate to disrupt some public spaces in order to draw attention to problems, a prolonged refusal to move to designated areas can only be seen as mobocracy in action, even if it relatively free of violence.

Mob protests and street violence will become the norm unless the police-investigative-judicial system is capable of handling them without excess violence. Right now, the state lies prostrate while the mobs have the power to blackmail governments. Police beating up protesters is not democracy; but a police force that can do nothing to prevent mob violence and disruption is no help to democracy either.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 03, 2020 6:48 am

crams wrote:
Tue Dec 01, 2020 4:16 pm
Well, well, well. It does seem farm protests are reaching a crescendo. I don't see any major damage yet. But for sure with Canadian PM issuing some BS statement, whit media taking notice, and above all, the 'farmers' (I deliberately put quotes, because I don't believe these protests are all by farmers alone) themselves taking a hard line and rejecting almost every proposal of govt except unconditional talks which govt has acceded to. As much as these 'farmers' are Indian and no harm in reaching out to them, but caving in to their brazen demands will set a bad precedent. Believe me p!ssfulls are watching these protests carefully as are Paki ISI (some of them are already embedded). So while talks are welcome, Indian govt cannot be seen to be buckling under pressure.

To get a measure of the thinking of ModiJi haters masquerading as 'experts' be it on foreign policy or the agriculture bill, please follow former amby K.C.Singh's twitter line. The guy has even endorsed Justin libarandu's gross interference in India's internal affairs.
kc singh is a dyed in the wool separatist.

back in the day, he was president zail singh's secretary

this is nothing but shaheenbagh-2 being organized and run by the same BIF guys who also ran shaheenbagh-1, after modifying it by incorporating lessons learnt from the earlier outing.

Same directors and supporting cast, but with different lead actors for the new sequel

earlier food and logistics support was provided by some gurudwara langars and sikhs but this time around, the same is being provided by local mosques and some muslims. The only imaginable common ground between all of these directors/actors is khalistan.

whatsapp traffic between the shadowy BIF organisers of shaheenbagh-2 seems to have gone underground and there is an uptick in the visual and electronic media support by alleged "agricultural experts" and "agricutural economists". Most of these "experts" sound like cranks who escaped from a mental institution and hold forth with a rabid leftist slant on the "farmers" demands.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 03, 2020 7:24 am

All the hypocrisy over the Farm Bills 2020 — in one place

All the hypocrisy over the Farm Bills 2020 — in one place

The astonishing part about these protests is not the hypocrisy, but the extensive documentary trail that these people left. There is so much evidence that one could compile a book on this, but let us run through the highlights quickly.

3 December, 2020
Abhishek Banerjee


Image
The staggering hypocrisy surrounding Punjab farmers' protests against the new farm laws (image courtesy: thequint.com)


What did the 2020 Farm Bills of the Modi government do? The Act merely gave farmers the option to trade freely outside of APMCs, anywhere within India. The other thing it did was to abolish the Essential Commodities Act of 1955.

Since then, thousands of farmers from Punjab have been agitating against the bill. And now they have brought their agitation to Delhi, along with a handful of farmers from Haryana with similar demands. So called ‘liberal’ media in Delhi, still chafing from an unfavorable outcome in Bihar, has lapped up the movement at their doorstep. They have branded it a general “farmers protest,” implying that the protesters somehow represent people from all across India.

For days now, we have been told that farmers from the rest of India want to join. We just haven’t seen any. This has been further explained by the conspiracy theory that farmers are being blocked by the police from entering Delhi. Half of India depends on farming, but apparently blocking a couple of roads have held off an agitation comprising around 60 crore people.

And now, every frustrated duck with a quack who is against Modi wants to be seen with the “farmers protest.” The Congress. The AAP, which is active in Punjab. The Dadis of Shaheen Bagh. Everyone. Even the Canadian Prime Minister who remembers how PM Modi ignored him for a whole week in India.

The astonishing part about these protests is not the hypocrisy, but the extensive documentary trail that these people left. There is so much evidence that one could compile a book on this, but let us run through the highlights quickly.

(1) Congress manifesto for 2019 promised exactly these reforms

Here it is, in writing. Quite literally, the exact same promise.

Congress manifesto
And as for the Essential Commodities Act, the Congress had this to say.

Congress manifesto
Again, the language could not be clearer. The Congress went so far as to dismiss the Essential Commodities Act of 1955 as belonging to the “age of controls.” Imagine the situation when the Congress manifesto appears to take a potshot at Nehru.

It doesn’t end here. There is also an extensive trail of evidence of Dr. Manmohan Singh advocating for states to amend the APMC act and give more freedom to the farmer (see here in 2012 and here in 2009). But in typical UPA fashion, he didn’t actually get anything done. And now when the Modi government has implemented their own manifesto item, the Congress opportunistically has a problem with it.

Additionally, even though the latest Farm bills say nothing about Minimum Support Price (MSP) and do not alter the existing MSP regime in any way, the matter of MSP has been dragged into these protests. So perhaps it makes sense to mention here what Dr. Raghuram Rajan had to say on MSP back in 2014, when he was RBI governor.


Raghuram Rajan on MSP
And for good measure, the article also says:

“He also said the Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Act, which governs marketing of agriculture produce, needs to be amended.“

MSP hikes cause inflation, eh? Bear in mind that Dr. Rajan also advised the Congress on key economic promises in their 2019 manifesto. Perhaps Dr. Rajan would like to do the nation a favor by explaining to the protesting farmers from Punjab exactly what is wrong with MSP hikes.


(2) Canadian government had opposed MSP for Indian farmers, PM-Kisan and even PM Fasal Bima Yojana

One of the unique features of this so called farmers protest is the involvement of a foreign government. The Canadian Prime Minister has tried to intervene in our domestic matter. And quite shockingly, his intervention has been welcomed by a large section of the ‘liberal’ commentariat in India.

First of all, the Canadian government has no standing to comment in a purely domestic matter of India. There has to be absolute clarity on that. But the intervention looks even more sinister when you realize that the Canadian government has essentially been at war with the farmers of India. From 2015 to 2019, Canada has vocally questioned India’s farm subsidies and repeatedly accused India of violating World Trade Organization (WTO) rules by means of MSP.

It gets even worse:

“Canada sought details of the PM-KISAN programme under which income support of Rs 6,000 per year is provided to small and marginal farmer families. … Canada also expressed doubt over the eligibility of the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, a crop insurance scheme, as a permitted subsidy under WTO.“

Just think about the cruelty of that. Canada is a rich and highly developed country, with a per capita GDP of well over $40,000 USD. And yet Canada wanted to oppose a cash transfer of just Rs 6000 (roughly $80) a year to small and marginal farmers of India. Shame!

And today, with a straight face, the Canadian government tries to be the spokesperson for Indian farmers. This is like the wolf trying to speak for the lambs. Is Canada trying to stoke civil war in India by taking advantage of the particular demography of the protesting farmers who happen to be from Punjab and therefore mostly Sikh? And why is Canada getting support from Indian intellectuals? What do these intellectuals stand to gain from supporting a foreign government that is at war with Indian farmers? What will these intellectuals gain from civil war in India?


(3) CPI/CPI(M) did not even implement APMCs in Kerala

If you thought only the Congress and the Canadian government were being hypocritical, we haven’t even come to the so called farmers unions who are protesting. In media coverage of these protests, you must have come across numerous images of farmers holding the dreaded hammer and sickle flag. Indeed, the Left Parties came together to make a joint statement in support of the protesters.

Left parties being their hypocritical best
All state units? With the Communist Parties having their maximum strength in Kerala, I suppose we will see some large protests in Kerala. But you would be aghast to know the following:

“Being a state that has not implemented the Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC), farmers in Kerala feel that the opening up of trade with new farm laws might not make much impact in the existing trade systems in Kerala“

So there are no APMCs in Communist ruled Kerala at all! And yet, Communist parties are fear mongering that the new farm bills will lead to destruction of the APMCs and hurt the farmer! Well, it looks like irony just succumbed to the ‘Kerala model.’


(4) Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) demanded freedom from APMCs only in 2019

If you didn’t think it could get much worse, get a load of this.

What Bharatiya Kisan Union said on farm laws earlier

This is not a dream. You are not hallucinating. The BKU demanded in writing that the Indian farmer be liberated from the tyranny of APMCs. This is from the official Twitter account of Bharatiya Kisan Union, active since November 2015.

BKU Twitter account
You can go and check right now. The handle is very active at this moment, regularly posting updates on how they are leading the farmers protests. The industrial scale hypocrisy will blow your mind.

That’s all the hypocrisy I could find with a simple internet search and about an hour of spare time. I am sure there is much more out there.

Last but not the least, one thing needs to be said. While this article remains open for scrutiny, debate and criticism, the reader must be alert to a new kind of fraud that has taken off. These are left wing journalists who call themselves “fact checkers.” The intention is to dismiss anything critical of them with a banner headline that says “fake news.”

If you see such a headline, dig further. Remember, they are counting on you to read just the headline and skip over the rest. A genuine reason to label this article as “fake news” would be to show that I have altered the content of news sources, screenshots, etc presented herein. They won’t find that and they know it. What they might do instead is use weasel-words like “misleading” or “manipulated” below a banner headline calling it fake news.

What is “misleading”? And what is “manipulated”? Beware of some standard red flags (pun intended). No two policy proposals can be the same, word for word. In fact, no person can say the same thing twice in exactly the same words. Unless they can show that policy proposals from Congress, CPIM, the BKU and their new friend Canada were substantially different, don’t believe their labels. That is called debate, not fact-checking. Debate is most welcome, a sinister attempt to silence an opponent with a label is NOT.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 03, 2020 9:21 am

Worries of a Fresh Crop: Why the Spiralling Farmers' Protests Are Making Punjab Politicians Jittery


Worries of a Fresh Crop: Why the Spiralling Farmers' Protests Are Making Punjab Politicians Jittery



The concern is that the longer the impasse remains, the chances of a new alternative emerging grows. And this is something which none of the political parties want.


DECEMBER 03, 2020,
Pallavi Ghosh

After the euphoria now the apprehension. As the farmers' protests don’t show any immediate signs of ending and the protesters have dug their heels in, many political parties are seeking to benefit from the movement.

One thing the farmers have made clear is that while politicians may try to milk the protests, they should stay away from the actual protest spots. And this is what is worrying many political parties, especially the stakeholders in Punjab.

Cut to the Anna Hazare movement, which began in New Delhi in 2011 with a hunger strike in demand for the Jan Lokpal Bill to fight corruption. The government in power and the ruling Congress were in a pickle. The movement captured the minds of the people, especially the middle class, and many youth joined in. The more the Congress struggled to cope with it, the more powerful the movement began. And here too politicians from mainstream parties were largely kept away.

While the Congress, being in power, tried to negotiate, others like the BJP could only look from a distance but with smiles on their faces. The decimation of the Congress and the UPA in the 2014 parliamentary polls was largely due to the Anna movement and the narrative it built of the UPA being corrupt and anti-people.


The similarity with the present farmers' movement, however, ends here. Firstly, it's largely limited to north India and that too Punjab and Haryana. The Anna movement, while based in Delhi, had captured the space in many other parts of the country. There were similar movements in many southern and western regions. So far, apart from a few small groups, not many are supporting the farmers. But since the protests are close to Delhi, it has captured the mind of the media and also the Centre.

The other important factor is that till now the middle class hasn’t been drawn by the farmers' movement and protests. A senior MP from Punjab says, "It's early days yet, but so far the middle class has not been pulled into this. The day they are, the politicians would have a reason to be worried even more."

But as far as politicians, especially Captain Amarinder Singh, is concerned, they have a reason to be apprehensive. The Akalis are still having to grapple with the perception of being a part of the NDA cabinet when the farm bills were passed. Their exit from the government is seen as having come a little bit too late. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), many of whose leaders like Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia were part of the India Against Corruption movement of Anna Hazare, may be waiting to see what turn the protests take. If the movement throws up an alternate leadership, then the party's dream of capturing Punjab and Haryana may become more distant. And AAP knows very well what a movement, which is initially apolitical and with absence of political backing, may lead to.

Now for Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh. His worries are beyond just the movement. He has tried to adopt a middle path. While attacking Haryana chief minister ML Khattar for not doing enough for the farmers, Captain has been at the forefront to fight for the farmers. But the fact remains that Punjab is a border state and there is a worry that if things go out of control it could mean serious security issues for the vulnerable region.

The CM though is aware that as of now the Akalis and AAP to a certain extent are not on a strong footing on this issue. And this is fertile ground for the emergence of a new leader or movement like in 2011. Which is why Captain is also goading some farmer unions to speak to the central government to break the ice.

The worry is that the longer the impasse remains, the chances of a new alternative emerging grows. And this is something which none of the political parties want. So the more protracted the protests become, the chances of the middle class becoming embroiled and also it spreading to other states become significant. Not many Punjab politicians would want to see that materialise.


Another worry is a déjà vu moment for the Congress from 2005 when the 'kisaan-paani' issue had hit the party. The present protests are largely of Jat Sikhs and people from rural Punjab. With Hindus and urban areas still staying away from the farmer protests, the Congress and Captain are worried about polarisation which could work for the BJP with the urban and Hindu votes going to the saffron party in the 2022 assembly polls.

So, for now, the protests are being watched nervously by the Punjab government and politicians.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 03, 2020 10:51 pm

Meanwhile, back at the chinese ranch.............. :mrgreen:

this very rice imported from India may well be used to feed their pampered frontline troops intruding into Indian spaces.


As China edges towards a food crisis, it looks at India to feed its citizens

As China edges towards a food crisis, it looks at India to feed its citizens

Recently, the Chinese President had termed the wastage of food in China as 'shocking' and 'distressing'. In August this year, he launched a campaign in the country called 'Operation Empty Plate'.

3 December, 2020
OpIndia Staff

China to import rice from India


A major food crisis seems to be looming over China that is now looking towards India for the import of rice that is a staple for about two-thirds of its population. Apart from the Wuhan virus pandemic, China has faced calamities including floods, epidemics, locusts and also suffered trade setbacks that have shaken the food supply of the country. In view of the food shortage, Chinese premier Xi Jinping had even launched a public campaign to control food wastage.

According to a report by Wion, some Chinese experts had claimed that the country was possibly in the middle of a food crisis and China, as usual, tried its best to keep the news under wraps. After the reduction in rice supplies from Thailand, Myanmar and Vietnam, China has now turned to India to import rice. Traditionally, China has been purchasing rice from Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam and Pakistan but now the countries are quoting rates which were at $30 extra for a tonne of rice. The fact that China is importing rice from India despite the situation at the LAC shows that the country is in desperate need of rice. China has contracted Indian traders for the import of 100,000 tonnes of broken rice for $300 per tonne.

As per reports, several reasons are here for the current food crisis in China. The impact of the pandemic on agriculture, livestock diseases, disruption of global supply chains, disruption in the agricultural cycle in China due to lockdown, shortage of labour and devastating floods are some of the causes.

Chinese President launched a campaign to stop food wastage

Recently, the Chinese President had termed the wastage of food in China as ‘shocking’ and ‘distressing’. In August this year, he launched a campaign in the country called ‘Operation Empty Plate’. The campaign was first launched in 2013 to target big feasts organised by Chinese officials. Now, the campaign has been extended to the public. The Chinese President had asked people to prevent wastage of food and eat frugally. He did not mention anything about food shortage and instead claimed that the country had a ‘bumper harvest’.

As part of the campaign, restaurants in China started adopting special measures to stop wastage of food. The catering association in Wuhan, where Covid-19 reportedly started, was started in which the number of portions that one could order in restaurants was limited. The association wrote open letters to restaurants to be mindful of the amount of food that they served.

The ‘N-1 Model’ to stop food wastage

A new rule, called the ‘n-1 model’ was created which limited the number of portions of food served in group dining. This means that if food was ordered for a group of 5 people in a restaurant, only 4 portions of food would be served. As part of the campaign, the Chinese government removed videos showing people eating large quantities of food quickly as the government felt that the videos encouraged food wastage. Some restaurants in the country had reportedly started asking customers to weigh themselves before ordering food but the practice was discontinued after backlash.

The Chinese media have reportedly been denying food shortage saying that the quality of being careful with money or resources especially avoiding wastage was a part of Chinese culture. There were also reports of massive harvest in China.

China’s corn shortage

In the month of September, there were reports that prices of corn had surged in China as the country was heading towards a shortage of corn in the upcoming 2020/2021 season. According to reports, the country could face a deficit of up to 30 million tonnes which makes around 10 per cent of the total produce. The country was reportedly planning to import corn to satisfy its demand.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Fri Dec 04, 2020 12:38 am

China imports 1,00,000 tonnes of rice from India For first time in 3 decades.

chinese are buying it because we provide at cheapest rate i.e. $300/tonne for broken non-Basmati

This amidst the on going Ladakh standoff. China trying to de-hyphenate trade and border dispute and we are allowing it.

soon, the enemy country will be buying subsidized/discounted pricing Indian rice through PLAN proxies and carting away large quantities of our surplus production.

and they will soon be eating our rice to keep their troops well fed on the front lines facing India. :mrgreen:
and as suhel seth says

How stupidly compassionate of us! Which dolt took this decision of discounted prices? And who pays for this discount? Either the Government or the farmer: either way the common man



also read

As China edges towards a food crisis, it looks at India to feed its citizens

crams
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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by crams » Fri Dec 04, 2020 3:55 am

Chetak et. al,

Latest news reports say the latest round of talks failed. And what is more ominous, the farmers say they won't even attend next round of talks of rolling back the new farm laws is not on the anvil.

So this is a stalemate. What I don't understand are the following:

1. There are 100s possibly 1000s of farmers camped out in the open in bitter cold. Also, I doubt there are any sanitation faciliations. Which means p!ssing and crapping is all out in the open. This could lead to all kinds of illnesses. Plus Covid is still raging I wonder if this could lead to a humanitarian disaster?

2. I would wherefrom do these farmers get their cockiness? They don't want to budge from their maximalist position. Do they believe, or made to believe, that at some point govt will buckle? I mean the phrases they use, "this is the govt's last chance" and crap like that. Who the f!ck do they think they are?

3. My own feeling is that they are hoping to at some point cry murder and make this an international spectacle.

4. Then we have our own fraudulent media and assorted lobbies arrayed against ModiJi. If things go south, they will start blaming ModiJi and of course make it a Hindus "fascists" Vs innocent Sikh farmers issue

5. I don't this will fizzle out that easily like CAA-1. Recall even on CAA-1, it fizzled out once Covid struck. But even this time, if a number of farmers contract Covid, the BIF forces will blame ModiJi and BJP.

6. This is not going to be a pretty ending. I hope I am wrong.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Muns » Sun Dec 06, 2020 5:38 am

Swarajya, makes a couple of good points. BJP should be using more of its social media presence and also fighting the media war. It could also well used its two members in Punjab to make some kind of a voice. As with everything else, they are hoping that this will continue to fizzle down and die in the same manner as Shaheen Bagh and CAA.

The more and more these farmers continue to block roads as well as continue to cause an inconvenience, the more the public will slowly get fed up of them.

There is not even a discussion with regard to even meeting halfway. It’s just complete absolute rejection of the laws as well as repealing them. Even with multiple assurances that they will be no change to the MSP, farmer negotiators are just not having even a whiff of it.

While it is unfortunate that farmers do not want to really negotiate, what is really needed is complete media blitzkrieg on several social channels as well as government TV channels and radio as well. Why not come out with a comprehensive education program regarding the rewards the farmers will receive. In due course, many of them will start to understand the benefits in this movement will simply die out. I think the farmers themselves realize that is a fine line between peaceful protests as well as inconveniencing millions during a pandemic as well.

I’m sure the light will surely come with time.

https://swarajyamag.com/politics/dear-b ... ion-please

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Muns » Sun Dec 06, 2020 6:09 am

I never understood why the BJP was never able to previously make a mark in Hyderabad. Going there as a child, even I was struck as to the amount of churches as well as mosques, in comparison to local mandirs. Over the last decade plus there was an increasing evangelical presence especially in concert with US evangelical organizations and pastors promoting mega masses in a frequent manner.

The rise and rise of Owaisi perhaps has also had some effect. In any case, can it be that the Telugus now are slowly getting fed up, with essentially the mass conversion? Multiple ministers from Telangana have often said that the actual reports of Christians in the state are really around 30%. They have also been politically very supportive of KCR. Historically this is always been a Christian gameplay as well. Access and convert political leaders to pass laws in their favor.

The corruption is rife among the TRS, so that only minority groups have access to state funds while Hindus have been left to suffer for long. Can it be that finally the Hindu vote block is making some attempt at a comeback. Or is it too little too late and too much damage already done?
In any case, it has been a fantastic comeback for the BJP in the Hyderabad local Polls. The media continues to cry about divisive nature of the polls, but who really cares. Even the case with the recent floods and funding going to certain Christian and Muslim groups I think has really consolidated some of the Hindu vote.

Only time will tell whether they really decide to continue the same trend all the way to 2023.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Muns » Sun Dec 06, 2020 6:51 am

What is it that Rajinikanth has up his sleeve? At 70 now, and with multiple health problems, he may not be as capable to run a large party on his own. He definitely I don’t think will link up with Kamal Hassan, in view of differing ideologies. It seems that you would like to re-energize and potentially break the Dravidian myth that has plagued Tamil Nadu for so long. Ever since Periyar, managed to create and sell his anti-Brahmin and pro Davidian bible, Hindus have been forced to hide under the DMK. I don’t think we can say that AIADMK was any better for Hindus in Tamil Nadu I feel.

Will Rajnikanth throw his weight behind a independent BJP party in Tamil Nadu, Will he support the BJP AIADMK alliance?

My guess, is that he will form his own party with subordinates but really will ally with the BJP which will mean hopefully the break for Dravidian politics finally in Tamil Nadu.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Aditya » Wed Dec 09, 2020 3:47 am

Yesterday it was Bharat Band by farmers, They closed all Delhi borders. After 3 Pm they opened it all but in the name of Bharat Band CM of Delhi, Kejriwal found a new drama. He blamed Delhi police that he is house arrest by them. All his party people tried dirty politics in the name of farmers. He is ruining Delhi in every aspect. By evening he himself came out and said that he is standing with farmers as a common people. On the other side, all of his MLA's was fighting with police. Even Farmers has said that they don't hate Modi and BJP. The opposition is trying to use their campaign for themselves.

https://twitter.com/MLekhiOffice/status ... 30977?s=20

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Wed Dec 09, 2020 7:06 pm

If Modi govt is forced to back down, or roll back these long overdue and much-needed reforms, then no govt in the next few decades will have the courage to implement politically contentious measures.

It will be a thunderous defeat for democracy and this is exactly what the commies, naxals, minorities and the BIF want, to keep India weak, divided and segmented as that will ensure that no govt as strong or as determined as Modi's govt ever comes to power again.

they want to derail India's and Modi's economic and social credibility on a global stage, weaken the reform agenda and tie down India in a third world paradigm.


I’ve been told that protesters are also demanding a 50% reduction in Diesel prices for agriculture & they are opposing the new draft electricity code.

They are overplaying their hand.

Do they realise that this money belongs to the honest taxpayers of this country?
Why are we even entertaining a blatant attempt to hold a city hostage with the intention of organised extortion that will benefit the middlemen, rich farmers and their feudal set-up in a few states which will come at the expense of India’s hardworking small and marginal farmers?
via@karanbhasin95

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by crams » Thu Dec 10, 2020 2:09 am

Look at the gall of the farmer protestors (combination of genuine farmers + assorted BIF). I can summarize the relative positions as follows:

1. Govt: willing to consider some amendments to the laws to allay concerns of farmers including written commitment to MSP and legal recourse. Recall, on the first few days of the protest, this was the demand. In fact, all of the protestors' friends in the media were asking precisely for this.

2. Farmers: Seeing the govt on the back foot, and international spectacle this has become, they have upped the ante. They want the laws repealed, period. And their concession: "we are not against reforms", but first repeal the laws and then we discuss how they can be re-enacted. Look at their gall.

3. I am going to be a bit cold blooded here. Not should govt now show the middle finger, but I say, they should wait out the protestors. Let them brave out the cold and come to their senses. Also, note I am told that there are roughly 20+K or so protestors camped on those highways. This is by no means an al India protest. I hope I am wrong, but this gathering could very well be a COVID super spreader

4. Finally, I am a bit mystified by Delhi population. Aren't they feeling the pinch with all access roads cut off? And I assume essential supplies and interstate commerce has also been curtailed. Aren't the Delhi population miffed? At some point I assume there will be a counter polarization against the protestors.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 10, 2020 7:04 am

high time that India restricted the unrestrained run of these guys, interfering in the internal affairs, influencing opinions and elections and suppressing, censoring content and opinions that they may not like, just to favor a specific narrative anti Hindu or anti Modi

next stop is twitter. just set fire to jack the crack's beard and take his opinionated ass down by ten, twenty or more notches :mrgreen:


U.S Government And 48 Other States Sue To Break Up Facebook, Call For Unwinding Its Acquisitions of WhatsApp, Instagram

via @swarajyamag[/b]

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Thu Dec 10, 2020 7:55 am

Arihant@haryannvi·16h

Bloody hell. 57% paddy procurement by Centre is from Punjab.

That’s Rs 38k crore.

Add wheat MSP cost of Rs 25k crore too.

Total Rs 63k crore of taxpayers money benefiting very small no of farmers in one state!

That’s more than total MNREGA budget.


https://pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=1679407

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Sat Dec 12, 2020 2:43 pm

Image


Padmaja joshi@PadmajaJoshi · Dec 10

Mamata Banerjee: BJP has no work. First the Union Home Minister comes here, then its Chaddha, Nadda, Fadda, Bhaddha who follow. When they find no takers, they call in their workers for doing drama

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Sat Dec 12, 2020 4:27 pm

Who feeds the farmers as they protest?



Who feeds the farmers as they protest?

Sunalini Mathew
DECEMBER 03, 2020


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Farmers who have just received methi from mini trucks | Photo Credit: Sunalini Mathew

At Delhi’s borders, vegetables, milk, even dry fruit and jalebis flow, as farmers talk of support pouring in by way of supplies

“Modi murdabad,” shouts a six-foot farmer and his companion, as they lift a bunch of methi each, shouting in protest, responding to the camera. They’ve just received their supply of vegetables for the night meal from a mini truck carrying greens brought in from the Beri Anaj Mandi in Jhajjar, Haryana. The arthi (middleman) says that everything has been donated.

At Delhi’s Tikri border with Haryana, today, methi and cauliflower seem to be the food for the day. Here, as life is lived out in trailers where upto eight people share space for the night, aggressive words like murdabad mix with gentler ones like seva, guru ki kripa, langar, bade dil wale (large-hearted). The farmers, mostly from Punjab, are gathered at Delhi’s borders to protest the three agriculture-related laws that will impact their livelihoods.

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Chhaas (buttermilk) that comes in barrels containing about 200 litres Photo Credit: Sunalini Mathew



At the receiving end

“In the beginning nothing had been decided about the food, so we brought our own: atta, dal, ghee,” says Bikramjeet, a 25-year-old farmer from Tarn Taran in Punjab, who helps his father on their fields of grain and cattle feed. “Then we got so much support from the people of Delhi, from the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee, from the AAP, the neighbouring villages in Haryana. Thoda-thoda bhi aa raha hai; jada-jada bhi aa raha hai (things are coming in a little at a time and a lot at a time). We are very thankful to everybody,” he says, readying to camp on the Singhu border (with Haryana) for a year if necessary, and to live this life.

Food wise life has not been a struggle. Bikramjeet gestures for us to join him in a hot meal of matar-paneer and roti. There’s sweet pure-milk chai with rusk and bread on offer too.

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A farmer eating kadhi-chawal offered free Photo Credit: Sunalini Mathew


Both sites are serviced by a range of organisations, individuals, and informal groups, who have come out to support the farmers. A few langar cooks have travelled with them and some of the older women make food. Mostly though men cook themselves, shelling peas, chopping cauliflower, stirring cauldrons of milk, pounding the almonds for kheer.

There’s large consumption of seasonal fruit, tea and snacks are always available (Hovis and British bread seem popular), chhaas flows in the sunny afternoon. A class 12 volunteer from Barnala, volunteering with the Jamindara Student Organisation of Haryana, says, “We brought six barrels of lassi; then six more arrived. Each barrel has about 200 litres. The disposable glasses may get over, but the lassi won’t.”

Two men from Patiala who were coming to join the protest drove down through the night, their car loaded with boxes of water, when they heard the people at the Singhu border needed it.

Selling at the border
Most stores in Singhu are shut, while those in Tikri are open for the locals, especially the sweets and savoury snacks that crowd the run-down lanes around.

At Singhu, just beyond the barricade, Usha Bhardwaj (above) runs a roadside dhabha that serves up mix veg, dal fry, two types of paneer (shahi, matar), and roti, all priced between ₹40 and ₹80. “Dal sees the greatest demand,” she says, adding that sales have doubled now. Before the lockdown, she was a beauty advisor at a cosmetics company. They hadn’t paid her, so she’s here now, with customers who come to visit the protest site.

At the Tikri border, Devender Bansal, who has run a little store on the highway for 18 years, says the protesters buy mostly water from him, with namkeen forming just 5% of his sales.

In Delhi, United Sikhs, an organisation that provides humanitarian aid, has also come in with water. “We brought only water, but people said take this too,” says Jaspal Singh, of the mathri and biscuits he has on offer. It’s almost a continuation of the lockdown spirit, when citizens gave of whatever they could.

Rohit Rathee is one of those who provided food for migrants. He works with an MNC in Delhi, but is here because his grandfather was a farmer: “Hum dil se kisan hain (We’re farmers at heart),” he says. Supplies come in from Kaithal, Haryana, and are cooked on site. His team has made arrangements for gas cylinders, but there’s also a lot of food being cooked on wood fires. At a meal of kadhi-chawal, there may be about 200 kg of rice, 50 kg of besan and 300 litres of milk used. It feeds about 2,000 people.

Crossing borders

What’s different between the two borders is that Singhu seems to have more, their cups quite literally overflowing. Unfortunately, the garbage is piling up — plastic cups and plates thrown in front of the guru ka langar offered by the Bangla Sahib and Rakab Ganj Sahib gurudwaras. People sit in neat rows on the road, on long mats, as simple food is ladled out.

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Men shelling peas, preparing for the evening meal Photo Credit: Sunalini Mathew

Even as the Nihang Sikhs cordon off a section, restricting those without a head covering or with shoes to enter the cooking space, their wood fires inviting people to stand around and stare longingly, everywhere else, people offer of the plenty: a jalebi, a banana, gobhi pakora.

At a long table, a bunch of about eight school boys stand, one with his voice not yet broken, calls to people to have some poori-aloo. They’ve come from the Pratap Sports School, Kharkhoda, Sonipat, where they study wrestling. A parent who owns a ‘gaddi’ and their bulked up teacher have accompanied them. They’ve commissioned a halwai to cook for a 1,000 people daily.

“Everyone felt that we should be there for the farmers,” says Vijay Dahiya, who works with the electricity board and has taken leave to do this, just one of the many who are showing solidarity with the cause.

The men from the crowd (and there are mostly men) are careful to point out that everyone from every community is there to offer food and other forms of help.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Sun Dec 13, 2020 4:26 am

Time For Special MSP Treatment For Punjab To Stop



Time For Special MSP Treatment For Punjab To Stop


Tushar G.
Dec 12, 2020

Image
Punjab farmers protesting at Delhi border.

Long Read: Time For Special MSP Treatment For Punjab To Stop
Punjab farmers protesting at Delhi border.

Snapshot
The government must move towards a more standardised and fair MSP procurement system that keeps the interests of other wheat and paddy producing states.


In the early days of the protest, there were reasons to take the farmers sitting there seriously (for the sake of argument, we shall assume they are indeed farmers for the length of this piece), and the government had indeed erred in their communication of the laws.

Today, the protests come across as nothing but a joke and the protesting site at the Singhu border has become a carnival setting with foot massagers, pizza ovens, libraries, and langars. In the garb of protest, the farmers have set up a mini-village on public property of strategic and national importance.


However, after losing a good bargain on 9 December, one that still is available to them today (12 December), the farmers are now threatening to seal off Delhi’s borders one by one, including those on the Delhi-Agra and Delhi-Jaipur highways, hindering the railway traffic, and even causing another Bharat Bandh on 14 December.

More than the reforms, the protests have become a matter of ego for the leaders in the protest, a matter of privilege for the provocating communities abroad and actors back home, a matter of status-quo for the farmers, a matter of major economic inconvenience for the people in the region, and a matter of law and order for the administration.

The government needs to step in now and demonstrate it means business when it comes to law and order.

There is nothing heroic about old women using national highways as their makeshift kitchens, nothing heroic about tents coming up with foot massagers and pizza places, and nothing heroic about brain-dead actors using the protest to fuel their filmy agendas.

Image
In the chaos at Delhi border owing to farmer protests, it is the common man who is affected.

This is anarchy sugarcoated in community charity, the cost of which is being paid by the common citizen. Thus, the government needs to remind the farmers of Punjab who the boss is.

The ‘annadata’ rhetoric designed to Punjab’s farmers must be squashed, to begin with. The protesters do not represent the farmers of India, but farmers of one state alone.

MSP (Minimum Support Price) is not applicable to all farmers of India, but merely 6 per cent of them. Six per cent!

If one goes by the agricultural output of FY20, it was worth Rs. 40 lakh crore, of which the total value of MSP operations was pegged at Rs. 2.5 lakh crore. Fruits and vegetables, livestock, dairy products have no MSP support.

The origins of this ‘annadata’ rhetoric lie in the green revolution nostalgia of the 1960s that propelled India to overcome the problem of food security, and the status-quo it resulted in.


Punjab’s Economic Survey of 2019-20 affirms the origin and the resulting status-quo and also indicates why is it so important for the farmers in Punjab to cultivate in an MSP-only regime.

In 2017-18, Punjab’s share of the total national area of cultivation under wheat was less than 12 per cent. Yet, it registered 18 per cent of the country’s total wheat production. For rice, the state’s share was 12 per cent of the total production in India, while the share in the national area under cultivation was merely 7 per cent.

The cropping pattern of the state affirms the dependence of the farmers on MSPs, given the push wheat and paddy cultivation have received. In terms of percentage share of cropped area in Punjab, paddy went from 4.8 per cent in 1960-61 to 6.9 per cent in 1970-71 to 31.3 per cent in 2000-01 to 39.6 per cent in 2018-19.

For wheat, the percentage went from 27.3 per cent in 1960-61 to 44.9 per cent in 2018-19.

However, Maize went from 6.9 per cent in 1960-61 to 1.4 per cent in 2018-19. Bajra went from 2.69 per cent in 1960-61 to almost nothing today. Oilseeds went from 3.9 per cent in 1960-61 to 0.5 per cent today. Pulses went from 19.1 per cent in 1960-61 to 0.4 per cent in 2018-19.

Of the 7,830,000 hectares of cultivable land available in Punjab, 3,520,000 hectares is under wheat, and 3,103,000 hectares is under rice. As much as 75 per cent of the crop production in the state is made up of wheat and rice alone (2018-19).

Thanks to free power and water in the state, the crop-wise yield (in kgs/hectare) for rice went from 1,009 in 1960-61 to 3,229 in 1990-91 to 4,132 in 2018-19. For the same years, wheat went from 1,244 to 3,715 to 5,188. Due to the fertile region, a thriving irrigation network, the state’s crop-wise yields (kgs/hectare) are 4,733 against 2,661 for all India in cereals, are 905 against 841 for all India in pulses, and 1,467 against 1,270 against all India in oilseeds.

However, there is also concern pertaining to the inputs that make these high yields possible. In fertilizers, the ideal ratio for the use of Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium is 4:2:1.

In 2017-18, the ratio at all-India level was 6.1:2.4:1, but in the same year, for Punjab, it was 28:8.6:9.1. In 1990-91, it was 58.5:21.9:1. Hail subsidies.

The subsidy story does not stop here. Across the last 10 years, close to 30 per cent of the electricity generated in the state has gone to agriculture. At a national level, this share is closer to 20 per cent. The taxes generated from APMC mandis have been instrumental in sponsoring free power.

The procurement justifies the means. In 2017-18, as much as 90 per cent of the produced paddy crop was procured and 66.4 per cent of the wheat crop was procured.

Punjab’s share in national wheat and rice production is 18 and 12 per cent respectively, but in the central pool that year, Punjab’s wheat share stood at 38 per cent and rice’s share was 31 per cent.

Of the 310.6 lakh tonnes of paddy procured in 2019-20, as many as 202.5 lakh tonnes were from Punjab, and of the 389.5 lakh tonnes of wheat, around 127 lakh tonnes were from the state itself.

Thus, as the farmers go on with the protests, the procurement from the state has registered a significant increase this year.

In 2018-19, as much as 35.5 per cent of wheat procurement and 25.5 per cent of the rice procurement in the country was from Punjab.

Wheat procurement went from 55 per cent in 1980-81 to 62.4 per cent in 2010-11 to 94.6 per cent in 2018-19.

The paddy procurement is around 90 per cent for 2018-19, from 81 per cent in 2010-11. The paddy procurement in the state is so good that paddy from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar is smuggled in the state to be sold at the MSP.

The question of status-quo comes in here. The country is now producing far more wheat and paddy than it needs.

For instance, from 534.29 lakh tonnes of wheat and rice in June 2016, the Food Corporation of India’s (FCI) holding went to 680.25 lakh tonnes in June 2018, and in June 2020, to 832.69 lakh tonnes.

In September 2020, it came down to 700 lakh tonnes, given a free supply of wheat and rice was promised under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana due to Covid-19.

What happens when the need to supply free food grains runs out?

However, while our wheat and paddy godowns, much like the bank lockers of Punjab farmers, overflow, India is paying high import bills for pulses and oilseeds.

In 2017-18 alone, India’s import of pulses was valued at Rs. 28,500 crore and of oilseeds at Rs. 394 crore. Imagine if the farmers in Punjab tried diluting their obsession with wheat and paddy?

Since the green revolution, and now for almost six decades, the FCI and the Central government has been focussed on massive procurement. However, those days are behind us.


What the protesters and administration of Punjab want are three things.

One, for the MSP, to continue (which it is) for them to be able to continuously grow wheat and rice. Two, for the procurement of rice and wheat, to be focussed on Punjab, even if it means overflowing FCI godowns, and rotting grains as long as the MSP is ensured.

Three, for the procurement, to only happen through mandis, which ensures the state has enough money from the tax levied in transactions to sponsor the subsidies that fuel the cultivation of paddy and wheat.

Hence, any mention of the private sector, contracted farming, private mandis and transactions is as frightening for these protesters as an election result is for Rahul Gandhi.

All in all, Punjab’s dependence on wheat and paddy is no different than the Indian Cricket Team of the 90s on Sachin Tendulkar to chase down 250+ scores.


In 2019-20’s Rabi season, of the total 341.32 lakh tonnes of wheat procured, 129.12 came from Punjab, while only 37 lakh tonnes came from Uttar Pradesh and 67.25 lakh tonnes from Madhya Pradesh.

In 2020-21, due to Covid-19, of the total 389.92 lakh tonnes wheat procured, 129.42 lakh tonnes came from Madhya Pradesh and 127.14 lakh tonnes came from Punjab.

From UP, it was only 35.77 lakh tonnes.

In 2019-20’s Kharif season, of the total 519.97 lakh tonnes of rice procured, 108.76 lakh tonnes came from Punjab.

So, what happens if Punjab is unable to grow wheat and paddy five, 10, or 20 years from now?

Turns out, the conventional Punjabi farmer has failed to see the water bubble they are living in. The assured procurements and MSPs have resulted in a disastrous impact on the groundwater levels.

In Punjab, groundwater extraction for irrigation alone exceeds 90 per cent, more than any other state in India. Barring Rajasthan, the most over-exploited blocks in terms of groundwater are located in Punjab.

Of the 138 assessed blocks in Punjab, stated in the Dynamic Groundwater Resources Assessment of India – 2017 report, 109 are over-exploited, two as critical, five as semi-critical, and only 22 as safe.

The total annual groundwater recharge of the state was assessed as 23.93 bcm (billion cubic metres), annual extractable groundwater resource as 21.59 bcm.

Still, the annual groundwater extraction was at 35.78 bcm, putting the extraction at 166 per cent, highest for any state in India. Even for Rajasthan, it’s less than 140 per cent.

If one goes by the Dynamic Groundwater Resources Assessment of India – 2017, of the 35.78 bcm groundwater extracted, 34.56 bcm goes to irrigation.

For domestic use, it’s merely 1.01 bcm.

Turns out, the groundwater used by Punjab for irrigation is almost equal to that used by Gujarat, Haryana, and Rajasthan, and merely 5 bcm less than what Uttar Pradesh, a state 4.9 times bigger than Punjab, uses.

All this water goes to cultivating MSP-assured wheat and paddy.

The problem, however, lies in the future. The net groundwater availability in 2025 for Punjab is not even enough to compensate for its domestic requirements.

Other states suffering from the same issue include Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, and Rajasthan.

Thus, Punjab’s obsession with MSP-assured wheat and paddy will not only become impossible in the next 10 or 15 years (being optimistic) but make water-intensive cultivation almost impossible too, threatening the livelihood of countless farmers.

So, even if the protesters get the government to bend on repealing the three farm laws and going on to live in their MSP cocoon, they are soon going to run out of wheat and paddy cultivation options.

It’s a certainty.

So, what can the government do?

The NDA government, minus the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), is not politically invested in the state, so it has all the incentive to think about the larger picture.

BJP’s vote share in the 2012 and 2017 Punjab state elections was a mere 7.2 and 5.4 per cent respectively. In the 2014 and 2019 national elections, it was only 8.8 and 9.7 per cent. The BJP can think beyond the state elections of 2022 for now, for there’s no way it can win it.

The government can make the protesters two deals. One, continue with the amendments that were offered on 9 December, which include transaction tax and registration of private mandis, necessary for the state to secure revenues for power subsidies for wheat and paddy.

This is a good bargain for the protesters, even though it shall amount to troubles stated above in the long run. The Centre, however, should start decreasing its procurements for the cost of these amendments in a gradual fashion.

The silver lining here is that the farmers of Punjab may wake up to the groundwater realities and diminishing MSP returns and start cultivating other crops.

Two, it can agree to repeal the farm laws on the condition that the Centre procurement shall no longer be inclined towards one state, and instead be linked to a state benchmark like number of landholdings, the area under cultivation, quality of produce, etc.

Even if Punjab’s MSP procurement comes down by 15-20 per cent, it shall be a huge dent to the state's coffers.

This will dent Punjab’s wheat and paddy fortunes, making it an unthinkable deal for the protesters. The proportional procurement must start from 2021-22 itself, while the BJP-governed states introduce the same three laws through the state Assembly.

Let the private sector thrive where the ease of business is ensured.

The private sector would have been a blessing for Punjab, eager for both tech investments and employment. However, now that the state has allowed its long-term agriculture interests to be controlled by a few, led by the Congress Chief Minister himself, it’s time for the Modi government to bite the bullet and end the special MSP treatment for Punjab.

Ending the special MSP treatment for Punjab will also be critical in solving the problem of farmer income disparity that exists. While an average Indian farming household earns Rs. 77,124 each year, the one in Punjab earns close to Rs. 217,000.

For Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, the average annual income for a farming household is Rs. 58,944 and Rs. 74,508, below the national average, even though both are major wheat producers.

All farmers are equal, and it’s time the government’s MSP procurement factors that in and ends the special treatment for the state with immediate effect if the protesters refuse to end the senseless blockade.

Punjab, which has pegged its fortunes to merely wheat and paddy, must realise it is not in a position to bargain for long.

Punjab’s annadata is neither selfless nor godly, but one that thrives on the FCI buyout sponsored by the taxpayers, free power and groundwater that has an environmental cost to be paid by the future generations, and the generosity of the Centre it has taken for granted for decades now.

Punjab needs to overcome its Green Revolution hangover now. It’s 2020, not 1960.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by Muns » Sun Dec 13, 2020 8:12 am

Thanks for the above articles Chetakji, quite detailed but I’m starting to feel like this should really now be dealt with farmer upon farmer. The BJP has adequate reserves with regard to farmers in their ranks. Already we have seen localities within Rajasthan and even Haryana farmers that feel can take this in a great deal in the long run. We really need to bring of their perspectives and voice pro farmer views.

Bringing in the police as well as the Army or any kind of local authority I feel is a losing battle. Ship in busloads of Pro Haryana farmers in response. Create other national leaders who believe in the government strategy and asked them to take on the farmers. I don’t believe that this is going anywhere soon.
They seem to be eating well enough.

Aloo Gobi with Jalebi and Buttermilk Chai, I mean who seriously wants to leave that. It is also something about how good food tastes when especially your making it for tens of thousands of people.
This has to be a farmer versus farmer battle. Any other kind of intervention only gives BreakIndia forces another excuse to cry Modiji is like Hitler onlee….

Saurabh I believe is on his way to interview some Po Haryana Farmers, lets see what he comes out with.

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Re: The Great Indian Political Drama - 4

Post by chetak » Mon Dec 14, 2020 11:48 am

Thousands of iPhones looted, violence cost us Rs 440 crore: Wistron



Thousands of iPhones looted, violence cost us Rs 440 crore: Wistron

Sandeep Moudgal
Dec 14, 2020,


BENGALURU: Saturday’s violence at Wistron’s Kolar plant, where it assembles iPhones, has caused losses amounting to an estimated Rs 437 crore, the company stated in its complaint to the police and the labour department, reports Sandeep Moudgal.

The losses are primarily due to the theft of thousands of iPhones, allegedly looted from the unit during the violence, and damage caused to Wistron’s assembly line and factory equipment, the complaint said. Condemning the two-hour violence, Karnataka labour minister Shivaram Hebbar said the damages caused to the company were unacceptable.


Apple probing if Wistron facility in India flouted supplier rules:Report

According to the government, the dispute between Wistron and the contract labourers has been going on for three months. Hebbar said Wistron had contracted six subsidiary companies to hire 8,900 people for its Kolar unit.

“Besides, the company had 1,200 permanent employees,” he added. Industries minister Jagadish Shettar said the violence was, perhaps, fueled by miscommunication between Wistron, the contractors and the employees.

“What we hear is that the company had made payments to the labour contractors, who delayed payments to the employees. This is being verified,” he said. Hebbar said the labour department has issued notices to Wistron, asking the firm to pay the dues in three days.

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