Farmers always lose.

"The Centre reported a comfortable fiscal position at the end of the first quarter, helped by the large dividend from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and muted expenditure during the general election. The fiscal deficit at the end of June was Rs 1.36 trillion, or 8.1% of the target for the year," according to the Controller General of Accounts (CGA). ET. In May, the RBI transferred a record Rs 2.11 trillion surplus to the government, generated by its investments in foreign securities and highly clever transactions in foreign currencies. ET. A UN report on 24 July says that, "Food insecurity in India is declining," but "the majority still cannot afford a nutritious diet. A healthy diet comprising fruit, vegetables, plant and animal sources of protein, and dairy can be costlier than a diet loaded with calories." Unfortunately, the incidence of obesity has risen from 4.1% of the population to 7.3% because of empty calories from cereals and junk food, wrote Sayantan Bera. "An HT analysis from the recently released Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES) shows that only 56% of Indians reported eating three meals a day," "while 43% just had two." 63% of the top 10% of the population had three meals a day but this dropped to 52% in the bottom 10%. HT. "The HCES data clearly show that the share of children (those in the 1-14 years ago group) in an MPCE (monthly per capita expenditure) class having three meals a day is always higher than the overall share for the MPCE class." "This suggests that households treat the nutrition and feeding of children with more importance than everyone else in the family." "The proportion of stunted, wasted and under-weight children decreased by 2-4 percentage points between the 2015-16 and 2019-21 rounds of the National Family Health Survey," wrote Abhishek Jha & Roshan Kishore. "As per latest print, food inflation spiked to 9.4% in June, lifting overall inflation to 5.1%. Vegetable inflation, at nearly 30%, was key driver of food inflation spike, even as cereals (8.75%) and pulses (16%) inflation continued to remain high in the month." "Vegetable inflation will optically come down in July due to base effect (vegetable inflation had spurted to over 37.3% in July 2023), even as price levels remain firm," wrote Dharmakirti Joshi. Are farmers gaining from these high prices? Farmers always lose because the government forces prices down either by banning exports or by importing from other countries. "In December 2023, Centre suddenly banned onion exports," because "Going into elections, it did not want upset consumers. This decision left Nashik, epicenter of Maharashtra's onion market, with staggering losses. In Lasalgaon, for example, wholesale prices crashed instantly from Rs 25-30/kg to Rs 10-11/kg," wrote Jaideep Hardikar. "As a young exporter in Lasalgaon put it, he bore a threefold loss." In June, there were big headlines that Prime Minister Modi will release Rs 200 billion to help 93 million farmers. How much will each farmer-family get? Just Rs 6000 in a year in three equal installments. ET. Can't afford even one meal a day on that. Just cheap publicity with taxpayer money.