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These days we do get an impression that our country is progressing very fast. Our economy is strong enough to meet challenges of the changing World Economic Order. It has also shown the strength to absorb severe shocks such as the tsunami and earthquakes. The country has maintained a steady growth rate even after meeting unforeseen financial requirements without external help or dependence. The good news is that our foreign exchange reserves are rising; our growth rate is gradually improving; foreign direct investment is picking up in most vital sectors of our economy; the need for better and quality infrastructure is largely realized and there is greater stress on that; the quality of manufacturing sector is improving and the services sector has expanded vastly, giving greater hope for a decent living. But it’s unfortunate that despite the all round euphoria and hope, the agriculture sector is not showing signs of great revival. The growth rate in agriculture sector has been 1.1% as against the anticipated growth rate of 4%. Even new investment in the agriculture sector does not seem to be picking up, giving little hope, if any, of its rejuvenation. The need to develop new modern marketing structures, promote agro-processing units, diversification of crops and agricultural research and development does not seem to have attracted the desired attention of our policy planners to prepare our agriculturists for the challenges of global expectations in the WTO regime. In Punjab, we can ill-afford to ignore our agriculture sector. It is a fact that incomes of Punjab farmers have declined over the years. The farmers get pre-determined prices for most of their produce through MSP which has saturated. As per available information, during the last decade, the price that Punjab farmers received for their agricultural produce increased by about 51% as against the increase of 127% in input costs. Not only this, leaving aside the compulsive value addition to paddy, no value addition is happening to existing crops for the benefit of farmers. The state has no major agro processing units other than the rice milling plants. As a result, growth of agriculture sector has stagnated at around 1.5% in Punjab. Does the country have any plan for increasing the farmers’ remuneration, people who brought it out from the disgrace of hunger, poverty and food deficit? Today, we do not need PL-480. Nor are we dependent on any country to provide sufficient food for our population, primarily because of the Green Revolution in Punjab. The Punjab farmers continue to do their bit even now to ensure the country’s self-sufficiency in food. But not many of us realize that the same farmers, who produce enough food for us, are grossly indebted, suffering from multiple incurable diseases and staring at the severe problem of unemployment of wards and dependents. With increase in population, their land holdings have been fragmented to sub-optimal level and have, thus, become uneconomical. Most of the present generation of Punjab farmers are compelled to move out of villages in search of jobs. This has not only resulted in lower economic and living standards but also poor social upbringing—many end up as drug addicts or in other social evils. We need to remedy this situation very fast, arrest the deteriorating condition of our farmers and the rural poor through some honest and credible action. It is only then that we can say the country is getting empowered. I accepted this as a challenge on assuming the office of Chief Minister, Punjab. We promised to weed out corruption in public life and started a campaign in this direction. However, it did not take us long to realize that we had grossly underestimated the magnitude and dimensions of the crisis bequeathed to us by our predecessor government. Nevertheless, in pursuance of our promise of providing the Punjabis freedom from corruption and financial bankruptcy, we are following the path of good governance and transparent administration. We have ensured probity in public life and recruited people on merit, without any corruption and after dismissing those who entered the State Civil Services on the strength of money. We all know that there are comparatively lesser incidents of corruption and nepotism in the West because public officers consider themselves more as referees than market participants and power and responsibility are exercised as a trust for public good and not as an opportunity for private gain. We need to have a similar approach and address the issue of corruption in a non-partisan manner as a larger societal issue. Here again, the need to ensure credible action and a transparent system cannot be ignored. During the last three years, we have taken many credible actions to improve the economic condition of our farmers and the rural poor as also to protect their rights. Our action to protect the water rights of Punjab is one such example. The other major credible action is to provide full power input subsidy to all farmers of the state. Many economists questioned this decision. Perhaps they need to verify the facts more carefully: input costs of farmers are rising with grossly inadequate increase in output prices. Farmers’ debt-burden is increasing with no major relief in interest payable on agricultural loans. Capital formation and capital investment in agriculture sector have been far too low when compared with its contribution to the nation’s economy. What could have one done in such a scenario? Power input subsidy was the only thing in our domain and we did that without any hesitation. Some of our political opponents questioned our decision stating that we had wrongly withdrawn it earlier. We had promised free power in our manifesto. We had to withdraw this facility because of the financial bankruptcy that we inherited. Not only that. There was no money to make additional investment in agriculture and power sectors, there was no money to provide for recurring costs of power supply. There were problems in even paying the salaries of government employees. During the last three and half years, we purchased power worth Rs 3 crore per day to ensure adequate supply of quality power to sustain and increase agriculture production. It is only because of this, and the resultant assured irrigation, that agriculture production increased from 22 million MTs to 30 million MTs in the last three years. Diversification of crops is picking up gradually with increased cultivation of fruits, vegetables and other cash crops. Our major achievement has been the revival of cotton crop with the introduction of BT. Cotton production reached 23 lac bales in 2005 after touching a low of 5.79 lac bales in 1998. We have also taken credible action to ensure better opportunities for people moving out from rural to urban areas, by giving thrust to promotion and development of industries in the state. The new Industrial Policy evolved and adopted by our government has started showing results—investors seem to be realizing that there are no more bottlenecks for investment in Punjab. During the last one and half years, mega industrial projects of Rs 20,000 crore have been sanctioned. Hopefully, results of this investment will be visible soon with greater employment for our youth. We also hope to achieve major gains for our traders and businessmen with the opening of trade with Pakistan via Wagha border. A humble beginning in this regard has already been made. Our commitment to help and ensure development of the rural poor and the underprivileged, particularly those belonging to the Scheduled Castes, is total. We have overcome initial financial constraints and set up a dedicated Social Security Fund of Rs 450 crore for the social security and welfare of these segments of our population. Today, village panchayats in Punjab are disbursing monthly pensions of Rs 23 crore to the rural poor, widows, destitute and the aged. They are also empowered to implement 17 schemes of six major rural social sector development departments. To be honest, I admit that the issue of rural indebtedness, spread of incurable diseases in rural areas and unemployment are some of the major problems which bother me more than anything else, though the importance and urgency of developing quality infrastructure, including roads, bridges, power generation plants and social infrastructure i.e. government schools and hospitals, cannot be undermined in any way.

Source:< link http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=82605 Indian Express>