Uddhav asks officials to check rising onion prices, submit note on reasons behind spike

Onion prices have zoomed in the state over the past few days, hitting Rs 11,000 per quintal on December 2 in Nashik district, which sees the bulk of onion production in the state.

The Centre, on December 2, had asked the state governments to crack down on traders hoarding onions.

The Central Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution had also halved the stock holding limit for retailers to five tonnes and for wholesalers to 25 tonnes. Earlier, retailers were allowed to hold onion stock up to 10 tonnes and wholesalers up to 50 tonnes.

The state cabinet also discussion the farm loan wavier. During a briefing to the ministers, the finance and cooperation departments are said to have informed the chief minister that Rs 60,000 crore will be needed if a complete loan waiver had to be granted to farmers. The government is still reviewing the ways in which it can grant this waiver.

The ministers, meanwhile, also asked officials to expedite the disbursement of compensation that was announced for farmers affected by unseasonal rain. So far, the state has distributed Rs 2,050 crore to affected farmers.

According to the government’s estimates, the untimely rain in October had inflicted damage to standing crop on a staggering 93.89 lakh hectares of farmland across the state, impacting 1.04 crore farmers. Before the lifting of the President’s Rule on November 23, Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari had announced a compensation of Rs 8,000 per hectare up to two hectares for rainfed crops and Rs 18,000 per hectare for up to two hectares for perennial crops.