The Supreme Court-appointed panel, which was formed to review the now-repealed farm laws, has revealed in its report that most of the farmers’ organisations it interacted with supported the legislation. It said that out of the 73 farmer organisations that made submission to the committee, 61 representing 3.3 crore farmers supported the farm laws.
Releasing the report in the national capital, farmer leader and member of the committee Anil Ghanwat said that while the observations of the committee were of little significance now given the fact that the laws have already been repealed, it is significant for policy makers and farmers in general.
“On March 19, 2021, we submitted the report to the Supreme Court. We wrote letters to the apex court three times requesting it to release the report. But we did not get any response,” Ghanwat, who is the President of Swatantra Bharat Party, said. “I am releasing this report today. The three laws have been repealed. So there is no relevance now,” he said.
According to him, the report would help in making policies for the agriculture sector in future. Ghanwat said the committee has said in its report that a “repeal or a long suspension of these laws would be unfair to the silent majority who support the farm laws.”
The report also revealed that the SC-appointed panel had recommended that the three legislations should not be repealed saying they would be beneficial for farmers. The three-member committee had also suggested many changes in the laws, including giving freedom to states to make Minimum Support Price (MSP) system legal.
On November 19, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his address to the nation announced the withdrawal of the three farm laws, saying the government could not convince protesting farmers about the benefits of the agriculture sector reforms.
The three laws — Farmer’s Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act; The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Act; and The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act — were repealed.
The repealing of the three farm legislations was one of the key demands of around 40 farmer unions protesting against these reforms at Delhi borders. The protest started at the fag-end of November 2020 and ended after Parliament repealed the three laws. The legislations had come into force in June 2020 and was repealed in November 2021.