Former agricultural secretary Siraj Hussain on Tuesday said 16 point program for agriculture mentioned in the budget 2020 presented by union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman is a good roadmap.
"Allocations do not really bother me as PM Kisan's Rs 75,000 crore is not easy to spend. The thing is that the number of landholders is not really known. People who hold land in different states and who are eligible to get money under PM Kisan is not really known. So, we may not reach that number, we may not be able to spend Rs 75,000 crore even next year," Hussain said.
He further added, "The main thing is that the budget speech and the documents do not give any roadmap as to what will happen if the states do not implement the model act. So, these kind of details are missing. Probably, we will get to see them later in the year."
"I have not seen the National Agriculture Market (eNAM) getting implemented on the ground. Recently, I was in a mandi in Ahmedabad and I found that eNAM is a non-starter. It is absolutely zero on the ground. However, that should not worry us too much as the auction of various agricultural commodities was taking place there but they were using their own software. So, eNAM may not really happen but the other reforms in the agricultural marketing system they are waiting to happen," Hussain said.