16 teams of finance dept start audit of seven private sugar mills in state

Punjab agriculture minister Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal, who had ordered the audit, said that the teams of finance department were tasked with the job on Monday. “As many as 16 teams have been assigned. I had written to the Finance Department to provide teams so that everything can be audited and we get the correct picture about what these sugar mills have been doing.”

He added that these teams will visit the sugar mills in the coming days and prepare a detailed report. “We will see then what action is to be taken.”

Punjab has seven private sugar mills, including Rana Sugars at Buttar Siviyan in Baba Bakala, the one associated with former Congress leader and minister Rana Gurjit Singh. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government is already taking action against former ministers on different issues.

Sources said while AB Sugars at Dasuya and Nahar Sugar Mill at Amloh had cleared the dues of farmers, the rest are yet to clear dues of Rs 150 crore of last crushing season. Of these Golden Sandhar Sugar mill at Phagwara owes the maximum amount. The sugarcane farmers had recently blocked national highway in protest against the dues of Phagwara mills.

Rana Gurjit told The Indian Express, “They are most welcome to conduct the audit. There is no wrongdoing in sugar mills. Dues are a cyclic process. We pay them and then there is some balance. Farmers want the sugar mills to run. Cane is most paying crop. I can only say that two plus two will make four. I cannot make it six and they cannot make it three.

Had there been any wrongdoing, do you think the Enforcement Directorate would have spared me?” he asked.

The protests by sugarcane farmers to get their pending dues from sugar mills – both cooperative and private – have become an annual affair in Punjab.

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In Punjab, sugarcane is sown on 87,000-97,000 hectares of land. Farmers secure an average yield of 835-843 quintals per hectare. Last year, Punjab had 87,000 hectares under sugarcane and the mills had crushed 641 lakh quintals. The government has announced the State Advised Price (SAP) of Rs 345, Rs 350 and Rs 360 per quintal for early, mid and late maturing crop, respectively. During 2021-22, sugarcane farmers were to be paid a total of Rs 2,307 crore. They were, however, paid only Rs 1,400 crore.

At the end of the 2021-22 crushing season, 16 mills – nine cooperative and 7 private – were yet to pay farmers Rs 900 crore. Following a protest and after talks with the government, the mills cleared Rs 550 crore. As of now, cooperative mills owe farmers Rs 195 crore and private mills Rs 150 crore just for last crushing season. There are farmers who are yet to receive payments for 2019-20 and 2020-21 crushing seasons. The Phagwara mill is one of the biggest defaulters — owing Rs 72 crore of which Rs 36 crore is from 2019-20 and 2020-21 and the remaining of the last crushing season.