Punjab: Provide space for paddy, otherwise law and order situation may worsen

Punjab: Punjab has called upon the Centre to immediately provide space for paddy storage, else the state may face a “major law and order problem”. In response, the central government has asked the state to repair godowns and hire additional storage facilities for nine lakh metric tonnes (LMT) of grain from the Centre and state storage corporations in view of the arrival of new paddy starting October 1. The state and the Centre exchanged letters on Friday on the issue and the Punjab chief secretary posted them on social media today. In the SOS phone call and a letter, Punjab chief secretary Anurag Verma asked the Centre to immediately provide space for paddy storage. He said the unavailability of space could lead to law and order problems in the state. In the past, farmers had staged dharnas to protest against non-lifting of paddy due to lack of storage. Moreover, if the required storage facility is not available, the paddy produce will have to be stored in the open, he said. He said: “Normally, FCI gets milled rice by March 31. However, during KMS 2023-24, it could not provide space for the milled rice. Therefore, the delivery period had to be extended to September 30, 2024. Under these circumstances, the millers here are reluctant to lift and store the paddy arriving in the mandis during KMS 2024-25.” Verma said, “It is imperative that at least 20 LMT rice/wheat be shifted out of Punjab from covered storages. The Principal Secretary, Food Department, Punjab said that only 6 LMT rice/wheat was shifted out of Punjab from covered storages from September 1 to 22, 2024.” He had sought directions to all concerned to shift at least 20 LMT rice/wheat out of Punjab from covered spaces. “If this is not done, we will face a major law and order situation during the upcoming procurement season,” the CS said. In a demi-official letter, Mateshwari Prasad Mishra, director, department of food and public distribution (DPFD), said the FCI currently has a stock of about 132 LMT of rice and wheat.

“FCI plans to move more than 15 LMT of rice by the end of October. In addition, about 40 LMT of grain storage space will be created by December to facilitate rice delivery during Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) 2024-25. In addition, there is feasibility of hiring about 9 LMT of storage capacity in the state, which can be hired from central and state warehousing corporations (CWC/SWC) for storage of custom milled rice (CMR).” Mishra requested the state to get some minor repairs done in the warehouses available with the state agencies, which currently have storage of about 40 LMT of wheat, so that after liquidation/movement of these stocks by March 2025, CMR deliveries can be made in these capacities.

With the stocks fully filled and external movement slow, the state has been taking up the issue with the Centre. Chief Minister Bhagwant Singh Mann had also written a letter to the Union Food and Civil Supplies Minister two weeks ago. Raising the issue, the CM said that there is a severe space crunch with the FCI since May, which is hampering the delivery of KMS 2023-24 rice to the agency by rice millers. He said this has also raised apprehensions among rice millers about space crunch during the upcoming Kharif season 2024-25. Punjab is already preparing to buy a bumper crop of paddy this season. The paddy area has increased by 75,000 hectares and arrivals are expected to be higher than last year.