GUWAHATI, Dec. 22 -- Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday accused the previous Congress governments at Centre of ignoring the needs of farmers for decades and said that despite farmer-friendly policies in the past 11 years by his government, more work is needed to resolve all issues. "Farmers have a big role in the goal of establishing a Viksit Bharat (Developed India) and therefore our government is working day and night keeping their benefits in mind. In addition to agricultural incentives, it is necessary to ensure enough urea fertilizer for our farmers. This new plant will help achieve that," the PM said at a public meeting after laying the foundation stone of an ammonia-urea fertilizer plant at Namrup in Dibrugarh district of Assam. Modi accused previous Congress governments at centre of failing to upgrade the existing fertilizer plant at Namrup with improved technology which led to closure of some units in the complex it turn affecting urea production and agriculture output of farmers. "Congress didn't try to find a solution to this issue. Now our double-engine governments (at Centre and in Assam) are solving these problems created by Congress. Earlier, farmers had to queue up for fertilizers as many other plants across the country also shut down, and police used to baton-charge them (farmers)," he said. "Despite our hard work in the past 11 years to correct these issues (by reviving several fertilizer plants), there's still a long way to go to resolve all the bad things (that Congress governments did)," he added. The PM said that India is on the way to becoming self-reliant in fertilizer in the near future. In 2014, only 22.5 million metric tonnes of urea used to be produced annually in the country. In the past 11 years, it has increased to 30.6 million metric tonnes each year. "There's still more work to do. The country needs 38 million metric tonnes of urea annually. Hopefully we will be able to fill this gap soon," he said. Modi reminded that the Centre heavily subsidizes urea imported from abroad so that the burden of cost doesn't fall on farmers....