Potato and electricity have been the subject matters before the Odisha legislative Assembly. The debates may have been inadequate because of repeated adjournments, but very disturbing facts have come to the fore. We had in the recent past shortage in supply of potato. The prices rocketed to an unexpectedly high level. This received further impetus from the ban on sale of potato from West Bengal to Odisha. Kneejerk measures were taken by the Government and a taskforce was set up, obviously with an object of conducting a study and recommending measures that would prevent such instances from recurring. Some actions were professed to have been put into operation by the Government.
Surprisingly, during the debate in the Assembly, there was the unusual scenario of two Ministers differing on the quantity of potato produced in the State. Meanwhile, the poor farmers became a victim of lack of regulatory measures to curb the perversities of a free economy. lack of warehousing facilities, lack of marketing support, lack of marketing infrastructure, lack of a pragmatic policy to ensure a fair return to the farmer and a reasonable price to the ultimate consumer continues to keep the agro-sector unorganised and uncertain. This has led farmers to be subjected to the oppression of distress sale.
The study does not end with potato alone. Odisha is far behind quite a few States in production of food grains, pulses and oilseeds. For example, production of oilseeds in 2013-14 in Odisha was 1.7 lakh tonnes. Production of pulses is lower than many other States at 4.19 lakh tonnes. Similarly, sugarcane production has come down to 9.37 lakh tonnes in 2013-14. At the macro level, the lack of an appropriate policy and effective implementation thereof have been causing serious damage to the agricultural sector as demonstrated through the details narrated above.
The trend is towards a further decline and the priorities of investment need to be revisited. There has to be an appropriate dovetailing between the agro policy and the policies relating to public health, education, civic facilities and so on in the social sector. The irrational manner of massive acquisition of productive agricultural land, including many ayacut areas of irrigation projects, and the lack of infrastructure relevant to these spheres have set a vicious circle in motion. A movement towards reforms and an increased attention thereto require to be reviewed without any avoidable delay. The social security and economic protection an industrial worker enjoys are hardly available to an agricultural worker.
The production is still dependent on the vagaries of monsoon. A scientific restructuring of the cultivable land for different purposes has to be undertaken. Investment in agriculture has to be encouraged through appropriate incentives and administrative support. The law relating to and the structure of rural credit are either outmoded or overcomplicated. By contrast, what is not available to the agricultural sector is benevolently available to the industrial sector. The object of this column is not to be cynical. The constructive suggestion would be to treat “agriculture” “as industry”. But that would also require reframing the laws for the entire gamut of activities in the agricultural sector. A comprehensive legislation, pursuant to a purposive study and concrete programmes has to be undertaken on a war footing. The unimaginative conversion of words “rural” into “urban” would not itself be in the interest of an inclusive growth with distributive justice being the lifeblood of the entire structure.
To begin with, a programmatic action to provide a linkage between the agro sector and the giant marketing corporate houses needs to be put into operation. Presently, the concerned corporate houses have, in some cases, established their own direct channel with the farmer. It is now necessary that the linkage infrastructure is reformed and restructured. The activities from farm to the table should be regulated by an integrated policy. With a bit of imaginative reorientation, we should turn out to be a State which can feed others. The present industrial policy has no correlation with the agricultural policy. Departments, agencies, orgasnisations, instrumentalities, etc., have gone on increasing. We have been subjected to so-called “reforms” on the advice of foreign consultancy organisations. We have capable persons available to launch a new green revolution and a brain-trust could be created for that purpose.
These measures need not be in any manner subversive of any investment in “industry”. But we have an industrial policy without any adequate attention and protection to agriculture. It is bound to cause an internal imbalance. This has been demonstrated in the cases of essential goods like potato and onion. There is no social objective-based land policy so that there is optimum utilisation of available land. The water bodies and their resources have not received any adequate attention. The Central Government has been sensitive enough to revisit the inland waterways policy, which was used by our forefathers in terms of the then prevalent technology.
The land Reforms Act is loaded against plantation. Consequently, local items like coconut, banana, cashew nut and mango have attracted no productive investment on account of the expression “plantation” being limited to coffee, tea, coco and rubber. There are several other negatively restricting provisions in different laws relating to land and agriculture. They need to be consolidated into one code. The operation of restructuring has of necessity to take the prevalent situation as the floor from which one has to rise further. Imparting training and skill to the rural sector to meaningfully subserve the interest of that sector have to be restudied. So far as our State is concerned, all these call for an agro revolution.
The location of feasible industries, their socioeconomic impact and benefit could be studied by the Government and the land use plans could be attuned not to have a negative impact on the agricultural sector. Barren Government land continues to lie idle like a non-performing asset. These could be put to use including meeting the needs of the industry. That figure of such land has remained constant in our State and the areas under agricultural cultivation have shrunk. Productivity has declined. living solely dependent on agriculture is almost an impossibility. The orientation has to be changed to conceive and usher in an era of balanced, equitable and inclusive growth.
There is an absence of any organised voice in this regard. Technocrats and the professionals have a duty to call upon the Government to utilise their services to undertake this march towards Gram Swaraj. The conflicts, friction and clashes of interest between what we now call “agriculture” and “industry” have to be identified and suitably tackled. The youth most affected by this scenario need to raise their voice to release themselves from the bondage of unemployment, underemployment and ever-declining subsistence level of living. The uncanalised migration of the youth power from the rural to the urban areas is continuously contributing to the increasing social unrest. Millions do not matter when one is denied of a right to a square meal. Are we to turn our State and society into a Republic of HungerIJ This concerns us all.
Postscript: We have become “Odisha” from “Orissa”, but we are the only Indian State which has a road in london named after it, “Orissa Road”. The first day of April is confused enquiring is it ‘Odisha Day’ or ‘Orissa Day’. We should plan a delegation to london to reestablish a linkage between the Orissa Road and the present-day Odisha. Have our lives changed in any way with the change of the name, or is it only the April Fools’ DayIJ
(The writer, a Senior Advocate, is a former All India Service officer, a former diplomat, a former editor and a former Advocate General of Odisha. jayantdas@hotmail.com)