Have you heard of Jyoti Mirdha ?
If you haven't heard of Jyoti Mirdha, its your loss. She is an MP from Nagaur in Rajasthan, married, educated, net-sauvy and no nonsense person. Works quietly and keep away from the glare of the media.
But for her, millions of tractor owners across the country would have shelled out crores of rupees to blood-sucking insurance companies. The UPA government had thrown out tractors from the agricultural category in the finance bill. But this fire-brand Congress young Turk MP from Rajasthan got the smile back on farmers’ faces.
The union budget presented by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee in the Lok Sabha on March 16 had taken out tractors from agricultural category and put these vehicles in the commercial category. This increased the annual insurance premium on farmers from 300 % to 800 % - the figure varying from state to state. Jyoti Mirdha took up cudgels with the union finance ministry and urged the ministry to reverse this anti-farmer policy decision. For example, farmers in Rajasthan now had to shell out Rs 10902 a year as insurance from the earlier figure of Rs 1350. In Punjab, the farmers were now paying Rs 22000 for tractor insurance as compared to Rs 8000 they had been paying.
It was Minister of State for Finance Namonarayan Meena who supported Jyoti Mirsha and took up the issue further with Pranab Mukherjee and IRDA chairman. Accordingly, the amendment was issued. The quiet roll back was done even before the Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee could give his speech in the Lok Sabha on Finance Bill.
Mirdha’s efforts have paid off as IRDA Chairman J Narayan passed an executive order reversing the earlier. The order comes into effect from retrospective effect.
