Protests Against Farm Ordinances 

Protests Against Farm Ordinances 

Part of: GS Prelims and GS-II- Centre-state Relations; Policies and interventions

In news

• Recently, the Punjab Assembly passed a resolution and rejected the Centre’s recent farm ordinances and the proposed Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2020.

Key takeaways

The ordinances include:

• Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Ordinance, 2020
• Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Ordinance, 2020
• Essential Commodities (Amendment) Ordinance, 2020.
• These ordinances are expected to allow free movement of agricultural produce between states and let the farmers decide to whom they want to sell their crops.
• The Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2020 centralizes the power sector through establishment of Electricity Contract Enforcement Authority.
• Recognition of franchisees and sub- licensees under the Bill might open the sector to private players.

Punjab’s Stand:

• Entry 14 of List II of the Constitution comprises agriculture as the subject of the states.
• Therefore, the three ordinances passed by the Centre are against the Constitution of India.
• These ordinances are a direct encroachment upon the functions of the states and against the spirit of cooperative federalism enshrined in the Constitution.

Important value additions

• Article 246 adopts a threefold distribution of legislative power between the Union and the states.
• The subject-wise distribution of this power is given in the three lists of the Seventh Schedule of the constitution:
• List-I- the Union List
• List-II- the State List
• List-III- the Concurrent List