Govt scheme turns out to be "substandard"

GONDIA, April 9: The "Substandard Paddy Procurement Scheme" launched by the State Government to help farmers whose crops were affe...

GONDIA, April 9: The "Substandard Paddy Procurement Scheme" launched by the State Government to help farmers whose crops were affected by unseasonal rains and hailstorms has served little purpose in Bhandara district.

The fact that the scheme has failed seems to have dawned upon the Government only now — and this became amply clear when Food and Civil Supplies Minister Haribhau Bagde, who was scheduled to visit the sub-standard paddy purchase ce ntres at the local Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC), failed to give an audience to the large crowd of cultivators, merchants and AMPC directors who had assembled there. The scheme had been launched in view of the unprecedented famine in the State.

The Government had issued a notification on December 22, 1997, saying that it would purchase damaged paddy (which they termed as of "unfair" quality) at the rate of Rs 320 per quintal through its agencies. But this rate was so low that even on the day the scheme was launched, it was clear that it would notattract any paddy growers.

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Besides, the cultivators were required to produce land ownership documents (7/12) to prove that the paddy belonged to them. A certificate — Certificate of Specification for Non-FAQ Paddy — was also made compulsory. The paddy-growers flayed the new policy saying that the certificate sought by the Government was not at all necessary. To obtain a non-FAQ certificate, an equipment to measure the moisture in the paddy was required, which was not available here, they explained. The farmers also alleged that the Government scheme was a mere eye-wash as the same paddy could be sold at the rate of Rs 380 to 410 per quintal in the open markets. There was no point in going through all the trouble of producing land documents and completing the cumbersome formalities only to sell the paddy to the Government at a low rate of Rs 320 per quintal, they said.

But as the cultivators did not lodge any formal complaints about these rules and the red tape, Government circles believed for sometimethat the centres were attracting substandard paddy at the prescribed minimum rates.

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