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Paddy procurement begins in Haryana
The process was to begin on October 1. The Central government has okayed the state government’s request to prepone it.
The Union ministry of consumer affairs, food and public distribution allowed the Haryana government to prepone the paddy procurement for the year 2024-25 from October 1 to September 27, marking the beginning of the process on Friday.
As per the communication to the state government, the paddy procurement season is from September 27 to November 15. This comes days after the government sent a letter, seeking beginning of the procurement from September 23, but later changed the date to October 1.
A few purchase centres in the state started receiving the crop early. Change in weather and protests by farmers forced the government to request the Centre for advancement of the schedule.
Kurukshetra deputy commissioner Rajesh Jogpal said the administration was prepared with arrangements and crop would be purchased at the minimum support price (MSP) of ₹2,300 per quintal and ₹2,320 per quintal for Grade A, as announced by the Union government.
In Yamunanagar, Haryana secondary education director Jitender Dahiya, along with DC Manoj Kumar, inspected the mandis.
Meanwhile, farmers in the mandis are being inconvenienced due to rain. They also allege that their crop is not being puchased on MSP. Besides, millers voice concern over the new custom-milled rice policy.
After a national-level meeting of rice millers in Ambala, Rajender Singh, general secretary of the Haryana Rice Millers and Dealers Association, said their Punjab counterpart is with them to register their resentment over the delay in the registration process and new custom-milled rice (CMR) policy.
On the CMR policy that demands 67kg with 25% broken in one quintal of paddy, he said, “Among our major demands is revision of driage charges, which have been reduced from 1% of the total stock to 0.5%. These had been fixed at ₹10 per quintal for nearly two decades, but in the past 20 years, operational costs have risen significantly due to increased electricity rates, labour wages, and inflation,” he added.
Former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda hit out at the state government, alleging that farmers are forced to sell their paddy ₹500 below the fixed price. “Paddy has been reaching the markets for many days. On top of that, the threat of rain is constantly looming. Therefore, farmers are forced to sell their crop for ₹500 rupees less than MSP. The change in dates has led to damage of crop in the fields and what has reached mandis, is not being purchased,” he said while speaking at a public meeting in Indri, where he sought votes for Congress candidate Rakesh Kamboj.
