The Rajasthan High Court on Wednesday issued notice to the Central and state governments asking why the two were not buying millet and cotton at minimum support price (MSP).
The division bench of Justice Sangeet Lodha and Justice Rameshwar Vyas issued notices while hearing a PIL filed by Pali district’s Kissan Welfare Society. Moti Singh Rajpurohit, advocate for the Farmers Welfare Society, argued in High Court that on June 5 this year, the Central Government had issued a notification declaring MSP of 14 crops. After that, the state government issued its notification in this regard on October 14. But the State Government did not include millet and cotton in it, while the Central Government fixed the MSP rate of Rs 2,150 for millet and Rs 5,800 for cotton.
This year more than 50 lakh metric tons of millet have been produced in the state. But due to no purchase at MSP, farmers are forced to sell in the local market. Farmers have also talked to the state government as well as Union Minister of State for Agriculture Kailash Chaudhary several times regarding this matter, but no solution was arrived at.
Eventually, a public interest litigation was filed in the High Court on behalf of the farmers. The petition claimed that if the state government fails in this work, instructions should be given to the Central government to make arrangements in this regard so that the millet can be procured at the MSP.
The High Court has asked the state government to file its reply on the next hearing along with details and affidavits related to the purchase of crops.