RSS affiliate supports farmers’ demands on MSP but says against ‘violent agitation’

The Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS), an RSS affiliate, has backed the farmers’ demand of “remunerative prices for crops” while saying it does not support the “violent agitation by some unions”.

“Movements in the name of farmers with political motives just ahead of the elections and the violence, chaotic environment, and loss of national property arising out of them only gives rise to negative perception of farmers in society. Farmers who are struggling to better their lives have to pay the price for this. Hence, the BKS does not support the violent agitation,” BKS’s Akhil Bharatiya Mahamantri Mohini Mohan Mishra said in a statement late on Tuesday.

Mishra went on to add that people are free to pursue their political ambitions but not at the cost of farmers. “We reiterate that remunerative prices based on the cost is the farmers’ right and they should get it,” he added.

The BKS Mahamantri, speaking to The Indian Express, said the BKS avoids using the term MSP and roots for remunerative prices for farmers based on their input costs.

Interestingly, the BKS has earlier supported the idea of a law guaranteeing MSP to farmers, which is one of the top demands in the ongoing agitation. However, with Lok Sabha elections just round the corner, the RSS affiliate seems to have issued a calibrated response.

In September 2020, when the now-repealed farm laws were being introduced in the Rajya Sabha as Bills amid protests by farmers in Delhi, the BKS had opposed them in their “current form”. The RSS affiliate, in its suggestions to the government at the time, had stressed that traders must be mandated to buy produce from farmers at prices not less than the MSP.

“The Bills are yet to be discussed in the Rajya Sabha. We urge that they are sent to