Why farmers in India are protesting against Modi government?

Thousands of Indian farmers from the states of Punjab and Haryana are now in a crumbling standoff with Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party-led government, demanding the repeal of three market-friendly laws. 

Together these controversial laws will loosen controls throughout the sale, pricing and area of farm produce that have guarded India's farmers of an unfettered free market for decades.

For nearly a week, the demonstrating farmers, followed by their families and friends, have faced water cannons and tear gases and moved ahead through the capital's borders. 

They have set up tents, prepared meals and rested in the open in the intense cold. "This demonstration is unusual. It is not motivated by politics or religion. Politicians are responding to it," states Devinder Sharma, a food and trade policy analyst. 

What do these three bills state?

Taken together, these three laws will loosen rules around the selling of the crop, including the pricing and warehousing of farm produce - laws that have preserved India's farmers from the open market for years.

There has been no mention of Minimum Support Price (MSP), the cost at which the government used to buy the produce of farmers.

These new laws passed by the Narendra Modi government also allow private buyers to keep essential products for future sales, which only government-authorised agencies could do earlier. They also outline regulations for contract cultivation, where farmers tailor their product to satisfy a particular buyer's request.

One of the largest changes is that farmers will be allowed to sell their produce at a market price directly to private players - agricultural businesses, supermarket chains and online grocers. 

Indian farmers usually trade the preponderance of their product at government-controlled large-scale markets known as mandis at certain floor costs.

These markets are run by boards formed up of farmers, often extensive land-owners, and dealers or "commission agents" who act as agents or middlemen for brokering sales, managing warehouses and transportation, or even funding deals.

It's a complex system underlined by several regulations and a multitude of personal and market relations.

The changes, at least on paper, give farmers the option of trading outside of this so-called "mandi system".

More than half of the Indian population earns from agriculture. On farms, but agriculture estimates for almost a sixth of the country's GDP. Decreasing potency and lack of modernisation have long hobbled growth. 

Prices of the crops can be recklessly shifting, and intermediaries form cartels and eat up much of the earnings. 

"The outrage over damage to operators was brewing. Now it's getting channelised within this demonstration upon the new laws," Mr Sharma stated.

Farmers in India are most small and marginal. Around 68% of these farmers own only one acre of land. 

While 6% of them actually sustain guaranteed price support for their crops, and more than 90% of the producers market their product in the market. More than half of the farmers, in the words of an economist, "don't even have quite much to sell". 

Farmers are mainly worried that this will ultimately result at the end of large-scale or wholesale markets and guaranteed prices, departing them into no back-up choices. For instance, if farmers are not convinced of the value proposed by a private buyer, they cannot turn back to the mandi or use it as a trade chip during interventions.

"First, farmers will get attracted to these private players, who will offer a more immeasurable amount for the produce. The government mandis will push up meanwhile, and after some years, these private players backed up by the Indian government will eventually start abusing the farmers without offering any Minimum Support Price (MSP)