Amid anti-farm law protests, govt approves Rs 3,500 crore subsidy for sugarcane farmers

Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led cabinet on Wednesday approved an assistance of about Rs 3,500 crore for sugarcane farmers. The move is expected to benefit around five crore farmers and workers dependent on it.

This has been a long-standing demand of the farmers particularly in the Western Uttar Pradesh. By this move, the government hopes to address one of the major concerns of the farmers, while sending a message to them to ease their protests.

“Farmers sell their sugarcane to the sugar mills. However, the farmers are not getting their dues from the sugar mill owners as they have surplus sugar stock. To address this concern, the government is facilitating the evacuation of surplus sugar stock,” said a statement by the cabinet committee on economic affairs.

This will enable payment of dues of the sugarcane farmers. The government will incur about Rs 3,500 crore for this purpose, and this assistance would be directly credited into farmers’ accounts on behalf of sugar mills against cane price dues, and subsequent balance, if any, would be credited to mill’s account.

This subsidy will cover expenses on marketing costs including handling, upgrading and other processing costs and costs of international and internal transport and freight charges.