use government vehicle and did not draw any salary. He looked upon it as an extension of his life-mission. The report of the Committee was submitted to the Government on 31 July 1990. Unfortunately, Singh got too bogged down in the political struggle. Devi Lal, his powerful deputy, himself wanted to be known as a farmers’ messiah and Singh’s proximity of Joshi was not to his liking. Singh found the SAC work politically inconvenient to him because of such internal dissention. Singh, unable to give much attention himself, formed a committee of Government officials to look into SAC Report. But they were the same people who had executed earlier policy for several years and were not really interested in the kind of radical reforms Joshi had suggested. Joshi never received any acknowledgement of that report. SAC was soon wound up. Joshi left Delhi and returned to Ambethan. Like numerous other reports of the various committees formed by government even this SAC report drowned in the ocean of files. Nobody really knew what eventually happened to that report. However, in hindsight, one good outcome of SAC report could be pointed out. Some changes suggested by Joshi in calculating the cost of production of farm produce were implemented by the Government. Consequently, for the first time that year, the rate of increase in the prices of farm produce was higher than that of the non-farm produce. For instance, earlier the cotton prices used to increase every year by say Rs. 5 or 10 per quintal; but in 1991 it was suddenly raised by Rs. 90. This big jump was a boon to the cotton farmers. However, it was never officially mentioned that this was the outcome of any suggestions made in the SAC report. On 15 August 1990, while speaking from Lal Killa in New Delhi as the Prime Minister, Singh announced that the country would observe coming decade as kisan dashak. It would be interesting to note that this was the suggestion made by Joshi in 276
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Sharad Joshi : Leading Farmers to the Centre Stage
