I just returned my village and was wondering what is the future for Indian villages. Villagers and farmers in India are interchangeable since folks who stay in villages are generally farmers or doing something related to agriculture. With the elections over this major component of the Indian electorate will be forgotten. Without exception all political parties speak for the farmer and claim to represent their interests. Farm loan waivers, subsidies, free electricity, irrigation projects are some of the popular promises farmers get.
Despite years of support from various governments, despite setting favorable MSP ( Minimum support price) and other support systems the Indian farmer struggles to eke out a living. What the political parties do not tell the farmer (read poor farmer) as a profession it is not profitable due to the economics involved in farming. Typical Indian farmer has marginal to small land holdings (<1 hectare to 2 hectares). Most of them also do share cropping to improve the economics but get into debt trap. With 65% of the population stuck in villages the country is loosing lot of productivity from this workforce who are involved in work which is not remunerative. Most worrisome is uneducated and partly literate youth wasting prime of their youth in villages.
The solution is to improve agriculture productivity, automate, build ware houses, eliminate middle men, encourage co-operative farming, grow high value products and encourage exports. Of course government should invest in infrastructure to make this happen. At the same time government should invest heavily in education of the rural children and help them move out of the morass they are caught in.
Indian villages are divided by caste, religion and are depressing with out any real infrastructure. If India wants to move faster we need to rethink our developmental model for our villages. Panchayat raj and other institutional frameworks did help in establishing democracy at the lowest levels but are not helping in improving quality of life in villages.
I hope Mr. Modi will speak the facts and give a new direction to Indian Agriculture and save the Indian farmer.
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