Ahmedabad

After suspension of castor seeds futures trade by NCDEX, the Gujarat unit of Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS) today sought delisting of the commodity from futures trading and said the Centre should introduce MSP for it.

BKS also demanded that all agriculture commodities should be delisted from futures trading in the interest of the farmers of the country.

“We welcome the decision of NCDEX to suspend the futures trading of castor seed. We had been persistently making the demand for delisting of castor seed since 2012 and have made representations about it to the central government and NCDEX,” BKS state president Maganbhai Patel said.

“Now we are waiting for our demand of introduction of MSP (minimum support price) to be fulfilled, which we are hopeful that the government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi will consider in the interest of farmers,” Patel said.

On January 27, the National Commodities and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX) had suspended futures trading in all running castor seed contracts to “maintain market equilibrium, safeguard market integrity and in general interest of commodities market”.

Gujarat and Rajasthan have the highest castor production in the country, Patel said, adding that Gujarat alone produces 90 per cent of India’s castor seeds.

“Farmers of both these states have not been getting their due prices for the last three years. The price today has fallen much below the cost of production for the farmer, which is around Rs 6,000 per quintal.

“Decline in prices to the extent of 48 per cent could have been averted if preemptive measures and prompt decision to suspend the contract was taken by the exchange,” Patel said.

Castor is a domestic monopoly crop as it is hardly grown out of India and the country can earn a lot of foreign exchange from its exports, he said.

“We also demand that all the agriculture commodities should be delisted from the markets as 80 per cent of India’s farmers, who are marginal or small farmers, suffer due to futures trade,” Patel added.

BKS’s national convention will meet in Jaipur in February to decide about the future course of action regarding their demand to delist agri-commodities from futures trade.

PTI