Farmers Movement Archive

Paddy procurement in Punjab, Haryana delayed by 10 days

BATHINDA: In an unusual step, the Union government has delayed the start of paddy procurement for kharif marketing season 2021-22 for 10 days in Punjab and Haryana. The Centre has blamed “inclement weather” for the delay, which may increase moisture content in the crop. The notification was issued on Thursday evening, just hours before the official procurement season was to start. Earlier, the procurement was to start from October 1 and the Centre had fully responded to the request of the Punjab government to allow procurement of up to 191 lakh metric tonne paddy. In a communication on Thursday to food, civil supplies and consumer affairs secretaries of Punjab and Haryana, the Union ministry of consumer affairs wrote that since maturity of paddy has been delayed as the moisture content is beyond permissible limit, it has been decided that the procurement of paddy under MSP would commence from October 11 in Punjab and Haryana so as to accept paddy stocks as per FAQs specifications. The Centre claimed that this move is in the “best interests of farmers” and to avoid any inconvenience to them. The Punjab government and farm groups have vehemently criticised the decision. Punjab chief minister Charanjit Singh Channi urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to intervene and direct the Union consumer affairs, food and public distribution ministry not to defer the procurement as everything has been finalised and the state government is ready to start operations from Friday itself. Farm organisation BKU Ekta Ugrahan general secretary Sukhdev Singh Kokri Kalan said Centre was just trying to harass farmers. “Now when farmers wanted to bring crop to mandis, the Central government has deferred it just to teach them farmers a lesson. We will not tolerate it as farmers have already suffered losses in cotton crop and do not want it in paddy as well,” he said.

The Times of India

2021-10-01

Amritsar