: In a big relief to farmers, the government agencies in Haryana on Saturday started the procurement of parmal rice in the mandis across the state.
Paddy had started arriving in the mandis since earlier this week and now the lifting operations will begin to clear pending stocks lying in the grain markets for the past couple of days.
The government has set a target of purchasing 55 lakh MT paddy on minimum support price (MSP) from 400 mandis of the state.
According to reports, private traders too were showing interest in purchasing parmal rice by offering ₹ 100 to ₹ 150 above the MSP of ₹ 2,040 to ₹ 2,060.
“This is for the first time after a gap of several years that private traders were also buying parmal above MSP as it will help farmers earn ₹ 3,000 to ₹ 5,000 more for per acre,” said a commission agent Parveen Kumar of Nilokheri grain market.
On the first day of procurement, mandis in Karnal district received over 3.50 lakh quintals of paddy and around 1 lakh quintals were procured on the MSP.
Karnal deputy commissioner Anish Yadav said that the government has appointed three agencies which have started the procurement operations and they have been told to ensure the lifting of procured paddy within 24 hours.
Poor yield worries farmers
The farmers said that this year they may suffer losses due to poor yield of both parmal and basmati varieties of paddy. According to them, they were expecting 20 to 50 per cent yield loss in the paddy due to the mysterious dwarfing disease and heavy rains last week.
“The yield of my two acres under the PR 114 variety has declined to 40 quintals against 64 quintals last year. Even the input cost has increased due to diseases and rains,” said farmer Jai Pal after selling his produce at Radaur grain market of Kurukshetra district.
However, some farmers had to face problems as the paddy did not fulfil the procurement norms and had higher moisture content than the prescribed 17 per cent.
Officers to monitor procurement
As per the government orders, the administrative secretaries and deputy commissioners have been deputed to personally visit the mandis to review procurement arrangements.
The government has also launched e-kharid Haryana mobile app to assist farmers for procurement related issues. The directions have been issued to the district commissioners to ensure lifting of procured paddy as per schedule and transfer of payment into the account of farmers within 72 hours. ENDS
