National Farmers Day is celebrated each year on 23rd December.
This has been the norm since 2001 after the then government, in order to memorialise the legacy of our fifth Prime Minister Chaudhary Charan Singh, announced the day as National Farmers Day.
National Farmers Day is a day of gratitude towards the farmers of the nation, who are the backbone of the rural economy and feeders of the country.
The Kisan Diwas comes at a time of the year when farmers celebrate the withdrawal of the three contentious farm reform laws by the government.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the repeal of farm laws in the face of persistent protests,since last year, last month.
Chaudhary Charan Singh
Chaudhary Charan Singh was born on 23rd December, 1902 to a middle-classjat family,in Teotia Clan, at Noorpur village in the Meerut district of Uttar Pradesh. His family was a peasant family like majority of families of the time.
Entry into Politics
Charan Singh was highly motivated by Mahatma Gandhi and joined his quest for freedom of India and entered politics.
He was active from 1931 in the Ghaziabad District Arya Samaj as well as Indian National Congress in Meerut. He was jailed twice for being part of the latter by the British Empire.
In 1937, he was elected to the Legislative Assembly of United Provinces in the British empire.
Life as a Lawmaker
As a lawmaker, he took a deep interest in the laws that were detrimental to the village economy and he slowly built his ideological and practical stand against the exploitation of tillers of the land by landlords.
This was a journey undertaken by Charan Singh which took him to the seat of Prime Minister, though just for a small time between 28 July 1979 and 14 January 1980 after which a series of events forced him out of majority.
But Chaudhary Charan Singh had already left his mark in the hearts of general population of the nation who resonated with his ideas and pro farmer movements.
Chaudhary CharanSinghbelieved in leading a simple life.
Historians and people alike frequently refer to him as the ‘champion of India’s peasants.
Books by Chaudhary Charan Singh
He spent most of his spare time reading and writing. During his lifetime, Singh wrote many books and pamphlets on farmers issues ailing the society at the time.
Some of his famous writings are – Co-operative Farming X-rayed, Abolition of Zamindari, India’s Poverty and its Solution among others.
Problems faced by Indian farmers
If we give so much relevance to our farmers then we should also look at hard data to make up our mind and make sure we think of them the next time we are buying our vegetables, fruits, fishes, honey, or any other edible product, for some farmer has worked day and night to bring it to our table despite going through all his hardship.
The following are the reasons of hardship for our tillers-
Low Income levels
While agriculture is the main source of income for 58% of Indians, it is sad to see that it only contributes to close to 21% to our GDP, which means that more than half of Indians have to make do with almost 1/5th of the national income.
However, this disparity is worse with the small farmers as they control less land and have even less power to raise finances or get a better price for their produce.
Low land holding
But since India is a majorly farming nation, the number of small farmers would be very minimal, right?
Well, sorry to give you the disappointing news but 80% of Indian farmers fall under this category of small and marginal farmers.
Irrigation
The other problem ailing the farmers is irrigation.
While some states of the country remain highly irrigated like Haryana, Punjab and UP, others faulter. India, while being the second most irrigated country in the world after China, still has 2/3rd of its land unirrigated.
Over-irrigated
But it is not all good news for Haryana, Punjab and UP as the region has over the years become over dependent on the supply of land water which has resulted in lands becoming barren and unusable.