P. Sainath

large_01-Darshan_Singh_Sanghera-DSC01493-PS-Punjabs_arhtiyas-sins_of_commission.jpg

medium_01-Darshan_Singh_Sanghera-DSC01493-PS-Punjabs_arhtiyas-sins_of_commission.jpg

small_01-Darshan_Singh_Sanghera-DSC01493-PS-Punjabs_arhtiyas-sins_of_commission.jpg

thumbnail_01-Darshan_Singh_Sanghera-DSC01493-PS-Punjabs_arhtiyas-sins_of_commission.jpg

01-Darshan_Singh_Sanghera-DSC01493-PS-Punjabs_arhtiyas-sins_of_commission.jpg

“There is no such thing as a crisis
in agriculture.” 

Meet Darshan Singh Sanghera, vice
president of Punjab’s powerful Arhtiyas Association. And boss of its Barnala
district chapter. Arhtiyas are commission agents, a link between farmers and
buyers of their produce. They arrange for the auction and delivery of harvested
crop to the buyers. They are also moneylenders with a long history in that
trade. In recent years, they’ve emerged as input dealers as well. All of which
means they wield great control over farmers in this state.

The arhtiyas are also politically
powerful. They count members of the legislative assembly amongst their
brethren. In July last year, they honoured Chief Minister Amarinder Singh with
the title of ‘Fakhr-e-Quam’ (‘Pride of the Community’). Local media termed the
event “a mega felicitation function.”  It
came soon after the chief minister had said it would be difficult to waive off
the debt owed by farmers to the arhtiyas.

As many as 86 per cent of farmer and
80 per cent of agricultural labour households are mired in debt, says a study on Indebtedness among Farmers and Agricultural Labourers in
Rural Punjab. Its authors, researchers at Punjabi University,
Patiala, say over a fifth of that debt was owed
to commission agents and moneylenders. What’s more, the debt burden gets worse
down the scale. It’s heaviest amongst marginal and small farmers. The study covered
1007 farmer and 301 agricultural labour households. Its field surveys in
2014-15 were spread across all regions of the
state. Other studies too speak of deepening debt and mounting misery.  

Darshan Singh Sanghera dismisses
agrarian distress as “all due to the spending habits of the farmer. That is
what lands them in trouble,” he says firmly. “We help them with money to buy
inputs. Also, when they have weddings, medical and other expenses. When the
farmer’s harvest is ready, he brings it and gives it to an ahrtiya. We clean the crop, bag
it, deal with the government, the banks, the market.” The government pays the
agents 2.5 per cent of the value of total procurement of wheat and paddy.  The official side of their activity is
governed by the Punjab State Agricultural Marketing Board. The farmers receive
their payment through these commission agents. And all this is apart from the
income the arhtiyas
derive from moneylending.

We reached Sanghera’s Grain Market
office in Barnala town soon after visiting Jodhpur village in the same block. There,
Ranjit and Balwinder Singh recounted the very public suicides of their
relatives Baljit Singh and his mother Balbir Kaur within an hour after each
other on April 25, 2016. “They were resisting the attachment of their land by
an arhtiya who had arrived with a
court order and some 100 police personnel in tow,” said Balwinder. “Plus, many
officials of the local administration and several goondas of the arhtiyas.”  Almost 150 people in all – to attach the
family’s two acres of land.

“In this Jodhpur village alone,”
says Balwinder, “there are some 450 households. Of these, just 15-20 are debt
free.” And the debt has seen farmers losing land to arhtiyas. 

“Relations between arhtiyas and
farmers are not so bad,” says Sanghera. “And there is no crisis in farming.
Look at me, I inherited just eight acres. Now I have 18. The media sometimes
blow the issues out of proportion. Government compensation for suicides simply
encourages more of them. If even one family gets compensation, it inspires
others. Stop these compensations altogether and the suicides will stop.” 

For him, the villains are the
unions that defend farmers’ rights. And the worst offender is the Bhartiya
Kisan Union (Dakonda). The BKU (D) is strong in this region and a tough nut to
crack.  Their members turn out in large
numbers to block land attachments and seizures. Even when the arhtiyas
have been accompanied by gun-toting underlings.

“Most arhtiyas
have weapons,” concedes Sanghera. “But these are only used for
self-defence. When you deal in large amounts of money, you need security, no?
Mind you, 99 per cent of farmers are good people.” Apparently, the remaining
one per cent are troublesome enough to warrant armed security all the time. He
too owns a firearm. “It became necessary in the days of militancy in Punjab,”
he explains.

Meanwhile, debt-driven suicides are
mounting. No less than 8,294 farmers took their own lives between 2000 and
2015, says a study presented last year before the Vidhan Sabha’s Committee on
Agrarian Suicides. The report, titled Farmer and Labourer Suicides in Punjab, says
6,373 agricultural labourers also killed themselves in the same period. And
that was in just six of the state’s 22 districts, say its authors, researchers
of the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU), Ludhiana. The study, commissioned
by the state government’s revenue department, found that 83 per cent of all these
suicides were largely debt-driven.

“Nobody is committing suicide in helplessness,” asserts Teja
Singh.  “Farming is doing well these last
10 years. Arhtiyas have in fact
lowered lending rates.” Down to 1 per cent a month (12 per cent a year), he
says.  In village after village, though,
farmers spoke of the rate being 1.5 per cent (18 per cent a year) or higher. Teja
Singh is the arhtiya involved in the Jodhpur village battle that saw
mother and son kill themselves in full public view. “Only 50 per cent of all
these farm suicides are genuine,” he scoffs. 

However, he speaks with refreshing
candour of arhtiya
politics. There are factions, yes. “But whichever party comes to power, their
man becomes president of our association.” The present state chief is with the
Congress. Before the elections it was an Akali man. Teja Singh’s son Jaspreet
Singh feels the commission agents are being maligned. “Ours is just another
profession,” he says. “We are unfairly given a bad name. After our [Jodhpur]
case, about 50 arhtiyas
quit the trade.” 

However, Jaspreet is pleased with
the media. “The local press has been very good to us. We have faith in the
media. We will not be able to repay them. No, we gave no money to anyone for
favourable coverage. The Hindi press came to our rescue [when criminal cases
were filed against them after the Jodhpur incident]. We obtained bail from the
High Court quicker than we might otherwise have.”  He feels the Hindi papers are more supportive
since they back the trader community. The Punjabi press, he laments, tends to
be closer to the landed classes.

The state government’s October
2017 loan waiver was limited, layered and conditional. It applies to what
farmers owe cooperative banks and public sector or even private banks. And that
too, has unfolded in a narrow, restricted way. In its 2017 election manifesto,
the Congress party had promised a complete “waiver of agricultural debt of
farmers.”  And that the Punjab Settlement
of Agricultural Indebtedness Act of 2016 would be tweaked to make it “more
comprehensive and effective.” To date the government has not waived a paisa of
the Rs. 17,000 crore farmer debt owed to the arhtiyas.

A 2010 study recommended that this
“system, in which the payment of the farmers’ produce is made through the
commission agents, should be scrapped.” The study on Commission Agent System in Punjab
Agriculture by researchers of the PAU, Ludhiana, called for “direct
payment to the farmers for the procurement of their produce.” 

The story of commission agents and
farmers has a resonance across the country. But there is a novel element here. Unlike
most of their fraternity elsewhere, Darshan Singh Sanghera, Teja Singh and many
like them are not from the Bania or other trader castes. They are Jat Sikhs.
Jats are late entrants to the trade. But they’re doing well. Today, of the
47,000 arhtiyas
in  Punjab, 23,000 are Jats. “In the
cities, we are not the biggest group, says Sanghera. “I got into this trade in
1988. Even 10 years later, there were just 5-7 Jat arhtiyas
in this mandi.
Today there are 150 shops, of which one-third are Jats. And in the smaller
markets on the periphery, we are in a majority.”

Most of the Jats began as junior
partners to Bania arhtiyas. Then branched out on their own. But why would the
Banias want Jats as partners at all? When it comes to money recovery and the
risk of rough stuff, says Sanghera, “the Bania arhtiyas get scared.” The Jat arhtiyas
are not so squeamish. “We get the money back,” he says calmly. 

A group of mostly Jat farmers I
recounted this story to in Muktsar district laughed raucously. “He was telling you
the truth,” some of them said. “Jats won’t recoil from rough stuff. The Banias
will.”  The junior partners are on their
way to being big brothers in the trade. 

But perhaps the impact of that
partnership with the Banias still shows in limited ways. In Sanghera’s office,
we ask his son Onkar Singh about the five portraits on the wall. The first two
are of Guru Gobind Singh and Guru Nanak. The last two are of Guru Hargobind and
Guru Tegh Bahadur. The central one in this line up of five is of Shiva and
Parvati with a baby Ganesha. How did that come to be?

“We have entered this profession,
we have to adapt to its ways,” said Onkar.

Punjab’s arhtiyas: sins of commission

పంజాబ్ అర్థియాలు (మధ్య దళారీలు): కమీషన్ల పాపాలు

ಪಂಜಾಬ್‌ ಅರ್ತಿಯಾಗಳು: ಕಮಿಷನ್ನಿನ ಪಾಪಗಳು

പഞ്ചാബിലെ ആർതിയമാർ: ദല്ലാൾപ്പണത്തിന്റെ പാപങ്ങൾ

পঞ্জাবের আড়তিয়ারা: আড়ৎদারির পাপের খতিয়ান

पंजाब में आढ़तियों का मकड़जाल

ପଞ୍ଜାବର ଆର୍ଥିଆ: କମିଶନର ଅଭିଶାପ

پنجاب میں آڑھتیوں کی لابی

ਪੰਜਾਬ ਦੇ ਆੜ੍ਹਤੀਏ ਅਤੇ ਕਿਸਾਨ ਸੰਕਟ

பஞ்சாபின் அர்ஹ்தியாக்கள்: தரகு வேலையின் பாவங்கள்

पंजाबचे अडतिये मलिदा अन् मुजोरी

Barnala

At present, we can only accept donations in Indian rupees by Indian citizens. All donations made to the CounterMedia Trust are eligible for exemption under Section 80G of the Income Tax Act, 1961. Here is a copy of our exemption certificate.


India is bigger than New Delhi. And people need to know more about the rest of this vast nation.


Younger, media-saturated generations are growing up knowing little about their country, but a lot about the elites of a few metros and towns. For a narrowly-owned, commercially-driven media, the dumbing down of a nation is part of standard operating procedure. The last available data of the Centre for Media Studies (CMS, Delhi) show us that reports from New Delhi account for 66 per cent of news on the front pages of major dailies. The CMS data also found that just about 0.24 per cent of front page news came out of rural India. The TV channels are not much better.PARI exists to change that.We are a non-profit organisation. We publish under creative commons, and do not charge readers a subscription fee or put-up advertisements. Nothing is behind a paywall and we are completely free-to-access by anyone. We guard our independence and receive no direct grants from governments and corporations, nor any funding that could dictate our content. So, we are dependent on volunteer labour, donations from individuals, foundations and institutions that see value in independent and free media.PARI is changing the way Indian journalism reports and documents the rural.India is more than the elite of a few metros and towns. We report on rural lives and livelihoods, languages, communities, migrants and more. We need your help to pull off this most ambitious of Indian journalistic endeavours. The scale of this effort costs money. Donate generously - and spread the word about PARI.&nbsp;

Donate FAQs


हमारी दुनिया की झलक

पारी पर आपका स्वागत है

पाठकों के लिए हमारा सभी कॉन्टेंट मुफ़्त उपलब्ध है. अगर आपको हमारा काम पसंद है, तो आप हमारे लिए वालंटियर कर सकते हैं या हमारी आर्थिक मदद कर सकते हैं, ताकि हम अपना काम जारी रख सकें.

Want to republish this article? Please write to <a href="mailto:zahra@ruralindiaonline.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">zahra@ruralindiaonline.org</a> with a cc to <a href="mailto:namita@ruralindiaonline.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">namita@ruralindiaonline.org</a>

Punjab’s arhtiyas: sins of commission

Commission agents (arhtiyas) are a powerful lobby in the state’s agriculture and politics. Attempts to resolve Punjab’s agrarian crisis without breaking their grip on the farmer will not succeed

Related stories

A rain-scented walk in Sivagangai

Living on ravaged land

Biswas and the bamboos on his bike

Recycling energy, Godda style

Bhadels of Goa

Pookadai: still throbbing with morning life

Koli Kadlas

Malnourishment high among children of migrants: study

Wheels of the rural Indian West

Living Under a Red Cloud in Bellary

Vedla – earrings of the Maher community

Dreaming of water, drowning in debt

Kali: the dancer and his dreams

Farmer's diet worse than a convict's

In Yavatmal, life goes on

Suicides are about the living, not the dead

Death of a carpenter

Hoisa Shigmo!

Women farmers: weaving a life in Anantapur

Defiant in Dhinkia

Spice and all that's nice

Kerala's Green Army

The ‘jugaad’ not-a-mobile

Health as someone else's wealth

Calibrating in a Kudumbashree assembly unit