Going bananas: Fruitful dialogue

Jug Suraiya 

1st farmer: Have you heard about that actor-wala who paid Rs 442 for two bananas in a posh hotel?

2nd farmer: Of course I've heard about the 442-rupee bananas. Everyone’s heard about them. But what have those bananas got to do with us?

1st farmer: What have those bananas to do with us poor farmers? Those bananas have got everything to do with us.

2nd farmer: Everything to do with us? How so?

1st farmer: How so? I’ll tell you how so. But before that, tell me what you first grew on your land when you became a farmer?

2nd farmer: You know very well what I grew on my land when I first became a farmer. Like you, and most other farmers, I grew staple crops, like wheat and rice.

1st farmer: And did you make any money growing wheat and rice?

2nd farmer: Again you’re asking me something to which you know the answer. You know I didn’t make any money growing wheat and rice. None of us farmers did, including you. Despite the fact that the sarkar had promised us something called the MSP, or Minimum Support Price.

1st farmer: So after you gave up on wheat and rice, what did you try next?

2nd farmer: Again, like you, and others, I tried sugarcane, which everyone said was a cash crop.

1st farmer: And was it a cash crop?

2nd farmer: It sure was. Not for us but for the sugar mill owners, who made tons of cash by taking our crop and delaying payment for it for months on end.

1st farmer: Right. So what are you planning to grow now?

2nd farmer: I thought of growing veggies, the price of tomatoes being what it is. But then I discovered that it’s the middlemen who run the subzi mandis who make all the money, and we farmers are left with zilch.

1st farmer: OK. So what’s left then?

2nd farmer: I thought of trying what they call Bt cotton. But then I heard that a lot of farmers who did that ended up owing so much to moneylenders that they committed suicide. I’d rather die before I commit suicide, so I decided not to grow Bt cotton. Now I don’t know what to grow.

1st farmer: I’ll tell you what to grow. We’ll all grow bananas and get rich.

2nd farmer: Grow bananas and get rich? How’s that?

1st farmer: Very simple. Big hotels in the cities are selling bananas to people for Rs 442 for two, right? Which means that they’re selling bananas to people for Rs 221 per banana. So what we do is that we go directly to these big hotels — bypassing the sabzi mandis with their middlemen who take all the profits — and we sell our bananas to the hotels for, say, Rs 110.50 per banana, which still leaves the hotels with a 100 per cent mark-up on their sale price to their customers, and we’ll make pots and pots of money. So everyone will be happy. Except for those who have to pay Rs 221 for a banana. And who cares a fig — or a banana, for that matter — for them.

2nd farmer: That’s all very well. But why would anyone in their right mind be willing to pay Rs 221 for a banana?

1st farmer: Why? Because the incident of that actor chap paying Rs 442 for two bananas has become so big on social media that a lot of people who want to get talked about on social media will rush to big hotels with their wallets out, eager to whack out Rs 442 for a brace of bananas.

2nd farmer: No kidding. If that happens it’ll go to prove what some people have been saying about us.

1st farmer: Yeah? What’s that?

2nd farmer: That we’re a banana republic…