Chouhan tells farm unions the new Seeds Bill will leave traditional varieties unregistered

Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan sat with about 20 farmers' organisations at Krishi Bhawan on 10 September and said the draft Seeds Bill would not take away the right to save, swap and sell traditional seed. Registration will stay voluntary for farmer varieties. A farmer who produces seed for his own field, for the village, or even for a company under contract will not have to file a digital registration for that work.

The present Seeds Act dates from 1966. Chouhan told reporters that 70 percent of the seed Indian farmers use sits outside that law. Fake and weak seed is the gap he wants closed. The government put a draft out in November 2025 and took in about 18,000 comments. Thursday was another consultation, not a cabinet decision. He set no date for introduction. Industry voices want the Bill in the next session. Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and other states fall early next year, which is why farm unions watch the calendar as closely as the clauses.

QR codes, fines and a 15-day fund

Commercial varieties, producers and dealers would have to register. Packets would carry QR codes so a lot can be traced from plant to shop. Minor first offences would draw a warning. A second minor offence would cost up to Rs 50,000. Failure to fix a QR code, bad data or wrong branding would cost Rs 1 lakh the first time and Rs 2 lakh the second. Selling fake seed, trading without registration or clear fraud would cost up to Rs 30 lakh and could bring a prison term.

A Seed Security Fund in each state, filled from penalties and recoveries, is meant to pay farmers within 15 days when a crop fails because of bad seed. Local committees would judge the failure. Farmers would keep the right to go to consumer courts for more. States would get more room to clear varieties through their own committees for local weather.

A Central Accreditation System would let a company cleared in Delhi work across states. The ministry says that cuts duplicate licences. Farm groups say it tilts the market toward large firms and thins state control. That fight is not theoretical. Seed companies want one window. Unions want the window to stay in the state capital they can reach.

What Chouhan promised and what he did not

He said every policy would be finished only after talks with farmers and that traditional seed would be conserved. He said the law would not touch farmer rights. He also said the 1966 statute no longer matches the way seed is bred, packed and sold. Those two sentences can live together only if the exceptions for farmer varieties stay intact when the draft becomes a Bill and the Bill becomes an Act.

In January Chouhan had conceded that an earlier draft had no compensation clause and that farmers would have had to use consumer forums alone. The 15-day fund is the answer to that gap. Whether committees actually pay in 15 days is a state problem, not a Delhi sentence.

A separate Pesticides Management Bill was on the same table. Both statutes are old. Both are being rewritten in the same season. The seed text is the one that will decide who may print a brand name on a bag, and who may still pour grain from one farmer's bin into another's without a QR code.