ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the issue of recognizing the real problem of the Indian agricultural sector, which has worsened the plight of Indian farmers in both social and economic terms. In this discussion, an endeavour is made to establish that the Indian farming sector is caught in past policy faults and their consequences, and therefore, fresh thinking is need to figure out the causes of the perpetuity of the plight in the farming sector and then identify core areas of concern that need to be attended to, to improve ground realities for farmers. This discussion takes us to the conclusion that a two-pronged strategy needs to be followed to bail out farmers. The first part should focus on prioritizing all those development schemes that may ensure a short-term participatory social group approach to fast track alleviating distressed farmers and completing time-sensitive projects for draught-prone, rain-fed regions suffering from persistent farmers’ suicides. The second part should consist of setting up an Internet-based farm-management solution support service to remove imperfections in agricultural marketing and to provide farmers with interest-free payments, regardless of farmers’ production levels, to liberate them from the situation of taking perpetual losses and depending on debt.
