Q.With what objectives did ‘new’ farmers’ movements begin in the 1970’s ?

The ‘new’ farmers’ movements that began in the 1970s were driven by a set of objectives that went far beyond the traditional demands for better prices or credit. Their core aim was to challenge the very terms on which agriculture was integrated into the national and global economy.

• They demanded remunerative prices for agricultural produce, arguing that the cost of inputs had risen far faster than the prices farmers received for their crops.
• A central rallying point was the call for debt relief and an end to the exploitation by moneylenders and traders, who often trapped small farmers in cycles of debt.
• These movements also sought better terms of trade between agriculture and industry, insisting that the state should ensure a fair and stable income for farmers. …

The peasant movements of the colonial and early post-independence period were largely about land — who owned it, how much rent they could extract, and whether a tiller had any security. By the 1970s, that landscape had shifted. Land reforms had been attempted, tenancy laws passed, and in many regions the old landlord-tenant relationship had weakened. What remained, however, was a deep economic squeeze on the farmer who now owned or leased land but found himself at the mercy of markets, input prices, and government policy.

This is where the ‘new’ farmers’ movements broke from the old. Their central objective was economic viability, not land redistribution. The farmer, whether a smallholder in Punjab or a cash-crop grower in Tamil Nadu, faced a simple but brutal problem: the cost of seeds, fertiliser, pesticides, electricity, and water was rising fast, while the price he got for his wheat, rice, or sugarcane was either stagnant or controlled by the state. The gap between input cost and output price — the ‘terms of trade’ between agriculture and industry — was the real enemy.

The most famous demand that crystallised this objective was for remunerative prices. The Shetkari Sanghatana in Maharashtra, the Bharatiya Kisan Union in north India, and the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha all argued that the government must guarantee a price for crops that covered the cost of production plus a fair profit. They wanted the state to stop treating agriculture as a cheap source of food for urban consumers and instead treat it as a viable livelihood. This was not about charity; it was about market power. They demanded that the state fix prices through a formula that accounted for all inputs, not just a token minimum.

A second, closely related objective was debt relief and access to institutional credit. The 1970s saw a sharp rise in farmer indebtedness. Moneylenders charged exorbitant interest, and when a crop failed, the debt spiral could destroy a family. The movements demanded that banks and cooperative societies step in with affordable loans, and that the government write off or restructure existing debts. This was not merely a financial demand — it was a demand for dignity, for freedom from the usurer’s grip.

A third objective was control over water and electricity. In regions like Punjab and western Uttar Pradesh, the Green Revolution had made farming heavily dependent on tubewells and electric pumps. But electricity supply was erratic, and tariffs kept rising. The farmers’ movements demanded reliable, subsidised power for irrigation. In Maharashtra, the Shetkari Sanghatana led massive agitations for fair water distribution from dams and canals. The idea was that the state, which had encouraged farmers to adopt high-yield varieties and intensive irrigation, could not then abandon them to the whims of the electricity board or the irrigation department. …