"Today, we give farmers 2.2 trillion rupees in subsidies, fertilisers, power, crop insurance, seeds, credit, irrigation and a myriad other items," wrote Prof A Panagariya. "We have a massive programme of procurement of grains at above market prices; we give highly subsidised food grains to 75% of rural population; and we offer guaranteed employment for 100 days to one adult in each rural household." Farmers have been demanding waiver of loans from banks. According to their rough calculations "it will cost anywhere between Rs 4 to 5 lakh crore", wrote Prof A Gulati and P Terway. If this is added to credit from scheduled commercial banks and Primary Agricultural Societies then "the total outstanding credit to agricultural currently is likely to be around Rs 12 -13 lakh crore". "We run schemes that provide houses and LPG connections to rural poor and free primary education and free primary health care to rural households. Finally, substantial resources have been invested in bringing roads, digital connectivity and electricity to rural areas." "Yet, after seven decades of development effort, stories of widespread farmer distress remain a daily feature of our television programmes." Why? Because, "the share of agriculture in employment in India remains stubbornly high at around 45%" whereas "employment share of agriculture stands at 5% in South Korea and Taiwan, 3.5% in Japan, 3% in France, 2% in the United States, and 1% in the United Kingdom". The only solution is to create jobs away from agriculture to give farmers a steady source of income. But, how? Chinese mobile phones have taken over the Indian smartphone market because they offer more features at lower prices. While our pharmaceutical companies are experts are reverse engineering newer drugs and selling them at much lower costs we import 60% of all raw ingredients from China. The government is pressurizing automobile companies to stop importing high-grade steel from Japan and South Korea for use in the manufacture of auto components. Since such quality steel is not produced in India auto companies may stop production in India and start importing entire components from abroad. Auto components are one of the few manufactured products that we export. It is too late to create jobs so the government has passed a law reserving 10% of jobs and seats in higher education for poorer sections of upper castes. This has been done to get votes of upper caste Hindus in the coming general elections in May. However, this law is a bluff because total number of government jobs is shrinking and number of institutions offering high quality education is small. If all jobs are reserved for different sections of society what jobs will farmers get? Dish handouts with taxpayer money. Why get a headache?
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