New Delhi: The government has constituted a committee to strengthen the minimum support price (MSP) regime. The government had promised to set up a committee on MSP at the time of the withdrawal of the three contentious farm laws eight months ago. Former agriculture secretary Sanjay Agarwal will be the chairman of the committee.
It may be mentioned that the government had made a provision to include three members of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha in this committee, but the farmers’ organisation has not given any name for the committee so far. The Agriculture Ministry has issued a gazette notification regarding the constitution of the committee.
The committee included Ramesh Chand, a member of NITI Aayog, CSC Shekhar, agricultural economist from the Indian Institute of Economic Development, Sukhpal Singh from IIM Ahmedabad and Naveen, a senior member of the Commission on Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP). P. Singh is involved. Among the farmers’ representatives in the committee are National Award winning farmer Bharat Bhushan Tyagi, three members of SKM and five members of other farmers’ organisations – Gunwant Patil, Krishnaveer Chaudhary, Pramod Kumar Chaudhary, Guni Prakash and Syed Pasha Patel.