The mustard growers in Haryana are worried as the procurement agencies have not been purchasing their produce for the past five to seven days in various mandis across the state.
The government has been procuring mustard (40 quintals from a farmer in one go) at ₹4,425 per quintal minimum support price across 165 centres in the state.
Sumod Kumar, a farmer from Bhiwani’s Surpura Khurd village, said that the government had stopped purchasing their crop on May 20.
“Many farmers from my village had sold their crop and few of them have even received payment. But I have been waiting for my turn to sell the crop for the past eight days. When I contacted the commission agents and market committee officials, they told me that they will resume the procuring process after the government gives them a green signal”, he said.
“The mandi officials had issued tokens to the farmers at Behal Mandi on May 20 and since then many farmers in my area are waiting for resumption of procurement, ” he added.
However, since the procurement process was stopped across mandis, the private dealers have been procuring mustard at ₹ 4,100 to 4,180 per quintal.
Raj Bala, a farmer from Dadri’s Atela village, said that she was worried as the government has not been procuring their produce for the past five days.
“The commission agent had told me last week that my turn to sell mustard will come up by May 25. When I called him again, he told me that the mandi officials are not issuing tokens to farmers and the procurement process was halted for the past five days. He assured me that I’d be informed if the government re-opens mandis this week”, the farmer added.
On being contacted, Dadri market committee secretary Suresh Khokar said that the government had issued orders to halt purchase of mustard; to ensure lifting of pending crop procured from commission agents and store the same at government godowns.
“We are not sure if the government will resume the mustard procurement process”, Khokhar added.
