Ajit Singh wants Ordinance on cane price withdrawn

RELATED NEWS New cane seeds could wipe out sugar shortage

The former Union Agriculture Minister, Ajit Singh, has asked the Centre to withdraw the recent Ordinance amending the Essential Commodities Act to replace the existing statutory minimum price (SMP) for sugarcane with a 'fair and remunerative price' (FRP).

"On November 19, over one lakh cane growers will gherao Parliament, when the House convenes for the winter session. The Centre has the choice to either withdraw the Ordinance or table it immediately for voting, and we will see to it that it is defeated," Singh told presspersons here on Tuesday.

He said that had already spoken to leaders of other political parties, including Prakash Karat of CPI(M), Arun Jaitley of BJP, Amar Singh of Samajwadi Party, Chandrababu Naidu of Telugu Desam Party and Naveen Patnaik of Biju Janata Dal, to ensure that the Ordinance did not go through.

'Unilateral decision'

According to Singh, the Ordinance was promulgated unilaterally on October 21, without any discussions with State Governments, political parties or farmers' organisations. Prior to that, the Centre only announced an SMP, which, in turn, was a benchmark price used to compute the price of levy sugar supplied by mills for the public distribution system.

The SMP regime further gave the State Governments the right to announce their own State Advised Prices (SAP) for cane, besides having a provision (under clause 5A of the Sugarcane Control Order, 1966) for farmers to get a share of the profits arising from excess realisation by sugar mills.

"All this has now been subsumed by the FRP. If any State Government will now announce an SAP that is higher than the FRP, the onus for paying the difference will lie not with the mills, but the State Government itself," Singh noted.

In the recent past, the States have hardly shown any will to take on mills that have refused to pay the SAP and obtained favourable orders from the Courts. "When States have no courage to enforce their own SAPs, how can one expect them to foot the difference between the SAP and FRP?" Singh asked.

'Mills get free hand'

Singh also challenged the contention of the Congress General Secretary, Digvijay Singh, that FRP did not come in the way of mills paying a higher cane price. "If that was so, what was the need to do away with a minimum price and replace it with a so-called fair and remunerative price? The fact is today mills have no obligation to pay anything other than the FRP and the States have lost their right to fix cane prices," he added.

"The only way to solve this dispute is for mills to sit with cane societies and work out a price acceptable to both parties. Unless this is not done and the Centre withdraws its FRP Ordinance, the country will face huge sugar shortages," Singh warned.

Taken from Business Line