evidence: A ~2,000-crore fund to set up a chain of modern markets for farmers, announced in the Union Budget 2018-19, has largely gone unspent in what experts see as a sign of how overregulated agricultural markets have kept farmers chained to outdated policies. [...] The Union budget 2018-19 allocated a dedicated ~2,000-crore fund known as the Agri-Market Infrastructure Fund (AMIF). Newly developed markets under the programme were to be known as Gramin Agricultural Markets or GRAMS. [...] Yet, according to the government’s Doubling of Farmers’ Income Report, 2017, the average income of an agricultural household during July 2012 to June 2013 was as low as ~6,426 against an average monthly consumption expenditure of ~6,223. Farmers can profit when they have ready access to markets. According to the agriculture ministry’s guidelines issued for the now languishing Agri-Market Infrastructure Fund on March 9, 2019, the proposed upgraded markets would have "substantially enhanced market accessibility" for socially disadvantaged Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe farmers. Some of the blame for the lack of progress must go to scheme’s design, experts said. The money for physical infrastructure was to have been utilised from the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Gurantee Scheme.