PMK president Anbumani Ramadoss on Saturday presented the party’s 18th shadow agriculture budget for 2025-26, allocating ₹85,000 crore — of which ₹65,000 crore will be spent through the State’s Agricultural Ministry and ₹20,000 through the Water Resources Ministry for irrigation projects.
Announcing the salient features of the shadow budget here, Dr. Anbumani said that of the allocation, ₹12,500 crore would be spent on capital subsidy for farmers; ₹22,500 crore for developing agricultural infrastructure and education; and ₹30,000 crore towards crop insurance schemes.
The shadow agriculture budget called for enacting a legislation to have all farm produces be procured by the government; fixing the procurement price at ₹3,500 per quintal for paddy and ₹5,000 per tonne for sugar cane; setting up an Agriculture Planning Commission; establishing a company exclusively for providing crop insurance; providing 50 lakh jobs (direct and indirect) in agriculture and allied sectors in the next five years; extending the Protected Agriculture Zone of nine districts in Cauvery delta; prohibiting land acquisition for SIPCOT projects; and permanent closure of sand quarries.
Opening three agriculture universities at Thanjavur, Vellore, and Tiruvenlveli; a new college for agriculture at Tindivanam; disbursement of ₹20,000-crore farm loan through cooperative banks; doubling milk production and increasing the work days under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to 150 days were some of the other features.
Dr. Anbumani further said that the PMK would attend the all-party meeting on March 5 on delimitation, and urged the Centre to ensure that the seats in all the States were proportionately increased. He also criticised the State police for “targeting political opponents instead of focusing on law and order issues.”
Published – March 01, 2025 11:47 pm IST