India’s Modi Should Hold Firm on Farming
Agricultural reforms have been badly mishandled but they’re too important to abandon now.
Protesters have shown a flair for publicity.
Photographer: Narinder Nanu/AFP/Getty Images
India’s agitating farmers show no signs of fading away. Angry cultivators have been camped on the doorstep of Delhi for weeks through north India’s bitingly cold winter. They have shown a talent for staying in the headlines as well, with attention-grabbing stunts such as staging a tractor convoy to rival India’s official Republic Day parade.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government looks rattled. But it should hold firm. The reforms that have so incensed protesters go further in addressing Indian agriculture’s most intractable problems than any previously contemplated. Those changes need to be protected, not abandoned.