A parliamentary panel meeting on doubling farmers' income adjourns due to lack of quorum

NEW DELHI: A meeting of the parliamentary standing committee on agriculture had to be adjourned on Friday due to lack of quorum. Only six out of 29 MPs turned up for the meeting which was supposed to be briefed on ‘doubling of farmers’ income by 2022’ by agriculture ministry officials.
Headed by BJP Lok Sabha member P C Gaddigoudar, the Committee has 21 members from the lower house and eight from the Rajya Sabha.
Sources said though there was some informal briefing held for a few minutes while waiting for the members to turn up, it was later decided to adjourn the meeting when only six MPs could finally show up. Another meeting of the panel is expected to be called within the next two weeks, they added.
The ministry officials during the meeting were expected to brief the panel over the measures being taken to increase farmers' income and the progress which could have been made so far.
The Modi government had during its first term set an ambitious target of doubling the farmers' income by 2022. Subsequently, an inter-ministerial committee on this issue was set up in April 2016. The Committee had submitted its report in September 2018, recommending various measures to achieve the target from 2012-13 level when average monthly income per agricultural household from all sources, as per the NSO survey results, was estimated at Rs 6,426.