No extra paddy buy this Rabi season, Odisha authorities says

By Express News Service
BHUBANESWAR: Despite the BJP onslaught over paddy procurement lapses, the State authorities on Saturday made it clear that the acquisition course of is over and there’s no scope for preserving the mandis open because the final date of sale mounted by the Centre was June 30.

The announcement got here at a time when BJP MLAs had requested Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to hunt the permission of the Central authorities for extension of procurement date until July 15 as many farmers couldn’t promote their produce as a result of lapse of token and different mismanagement within the procurement system.

“No more paddy will be procured as the time scheduled by the Food Corporation of India (FCI) for rabi procurement got over on June 30. Around 90.75 per cent of the registered farmers of the State have sold their produce against 82.69 per cent in the 2020 rabi season,” Cooperation Minister Ranendra Pratap Swain informed media individuals.

He mentioned paddy has been procured from 2.03 lakh out of two.24 lakh registered farmers involving a price of Rs 2,697.62 crore. The authorities had set a goal to acquire 71 lakh tonnes of paddy in 2020-21 Kharif advertising season (KMS). But the procurement exceeded by over 6.37 lakh tonne. The paddy buy underneath MSP in 2019-20 KMS was 70.56 lakh tonne, he added.

Reacting to the State-wide agitation by BJP over alleged mandi mismanagement and government-rice miller nexus, the Minister mentioned it is likely one of the political agendas of the Opposition social gathering to remain related. “Rabi paddy procurement was limited to only 17 districts. We fail to understand why the BJP took its agitation to 30 districts. Maybe it is their frustration over the popularity of the Naveen Patnaik government,” Swain remarked.

The Minister mentioned the rabi paddy procurement will not be finished within the neighbouring Chhattisgarh. This (BJP agitation) could also be a transfer to push paddy from different states into the procurement system of Odisha, he added.