Mr. President, Sir, this subject of agriculture has been brought up before this House in a variety of ways and a number of Members of this House have emphasised the need for the Centre taking it on hand. Well, it may be that there is a lot of force in many of the arguments adduced by them, in support of this stand. At the same time, agriculture happens to be the principal industry in this country, and practically one of the main functions of the State, and beyond taking certain powers for the purpose of co-ordination, I do not think the Centre is at all capable of handling this vast problem. I might also take the House into confidence and tell the Members that certain proposals perhaps somewhat on the lines of those now made, were put before the Provincial Ministers when they met here a couple of months back, and the Drafting Committee also was invited to discuss those proposals with them. But there was a fairly general resistance to any further inroads into the field of provincial autonomy, and the proposals had to be dropped. I do not believe that the Centre is without resources at all, in this matter. There are many ways of the Centre directing the provinces to make improvements in agriculture or provide other amenities to the agriculturists by means of the grants and so on. The experience that the Centre has in helping the improvement of agriculture for the last six or seven years, I think will make it possible for it to effectively help in the proper promotion of agriculture by grants. Beyond saying that, and beyond pointing out to the entries in List I and to the powers that the Centre has to give grants, lump-sum grants for specific purposes, I am afraid the Drafting Committee are unable to accept the suggestion to transfer practically one of the major items in the administration of State Governments, to the Centre, whether it be in List I or List III. Sir, I oppose the amendments.
