Madhya Pradesh busts major scam in paddy procurement process

Middlemen and businessmen impersonated farmers and registered themselves in the cooperative societies to sell paddy, which they purchased from different places at much lower rates.

A resident of Gulenda village of Jabalpur district Ajeet Rajak cultivated crop of green peas in his one acre land but his name was registered in a co-operative society to sell paddy crop in October, said an official of the agriculture department.

Labourers load sacks of newly harvested paddy crop on a truck purchased by procurement agencies. (Representative Photo/PTI)

Rajak is among more than 300 farmers in Jabalpur, whose names were fraudulently used by middlemen and businessmen to register online at co-operative society, the official said.

Middlemen and businessmen impersonated farmers and registered themselves in the cooperative societies to sell paddy, which they purchased from different places at much lower rates. The scamsters made money selling the paddy to the government at the minimum support price (MSP) which was higher that their purchase price.

The irregularities came to light during physical verification of farmers in Jabalpur after many of them had complained to the agriculture department that their names were being misused. . The farmers who grew some other crops on their farmlands, were found registered with societies to sell paddy. More than 300 such registrations of farmers were found fake in Jabalpur only in the past 10 days, said the official.

Jabalpur district collector Karamver Sharma said, “An FIR has been registered against three people including a businessman Kamlesh Patel and manager of a cooperative society of Gulenda.”

Sharma said, “The registration for sale of paddy crop took place from September 15 to October 15 and verification started on October 20. During physical verification, farmers were surprised to know that their names figured in the list with societies for sale of paddy crop. In the inquiry it was found that middlemen and businessmen accessed the names of farmers with the help of society members and registered themselves in their names. Some even registered in the name of people who had died a few years ago.”

“In the inquiry it came to light that the middlemen and businessmen, purchased the crop from farmers, who need money for different purposes in urgency, before procurement of the state government at much lower rate of ₹1,300 to ₹1,400 per quintal. Later, they registered in the name of farmers, who didn’t cultivate paddy or in name of those people who sold their agriculture produce to them so that these traders and middlemen could sell the paddy to the state government at MSP of ₹1,865 per quintal,” said the collector.

Raisen collector Umashankar Bhargava said, “We have started an inquiry in which we have received complaints and we are also carrying on physical verification of all the farmers.”

According to an officer, online registration of farmers from private kiosk paved the way for fraudsters.

“Earlier, farmers used to go to co-operative societies and got themselves registered. So, there was no possibility of fraud but now the farmers get themselves registered through the kiosks of MP Online. The kiosk owner, middlemen and society members hatched a conspiracy in the registration,” said the officer.

Bhartiya KIsan Union, MP general secretary Anil Yadav said, “The fraudsters are misusing online registration and the officers and cooperative society members are also a part of it. It is a major scam and happening in almost all the districts. If the state government does verification properly, thousands of registrations will be found fake.”

Last year the state government had procured 2.6 million tonnes of paddy and this year the target is 4 million tonnes. More than 5 lakh farmers were registered for procurement of paddy.