In a first, FCI procures wheat at two centres in Kangra dist

Rajiv Mahajan

Nurpur, May 28

The Food Corporation of India (FCI) for the first time has started wheat procurement at two centres in Kangra district. In the past, local farmers were forced to sell their wheat crop much below the Minimum Support Price (MSP) to private buyers in Punjab. This year, they are selling their produce to the FCI at two procurement centres at Fatehpur and Thakurdwara for the past one month. The two procurement centres became functional as a result of a joint initiative of the State Marketing Board and the Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC), Kangra.

Inquiries by The Tribune have revealed that the Kangra APMC has provided the requisite infrastructure to facilitate the FCI to procure wheat directly from local farmers without paying commission to arhtiyas (commission agents) or middlemen. It also facilitated the FIC to set up the procurement centre in 10 godowns at its grain market yard at Fatehpur that has been lying idle ever since it was inaugurated by the then CM Virbhadra Singh in January, 2017. The APMC has also made makeshift arrangements for the storage of the procured wheat in a vacant private warehouse at Thakurdwara in the Mand area of Indora subdivision.

Progressive farmers Suresh Singh of Malkhana, Anup Singh and Satpal of Thakurdwara say that the Mand area is known as a foodgrain bowl, as it produces bumper wheat, paddy and maize crops but farmers always faced difficulties in selling their produce.

Ranbir Singh of Chatta village, and Ajay Singh and Balwant of Takoli village in Fatehpur say that the procurement of cereals at the MSP is a long pending demand of the farmers of the area and the FCI should set up a permanent procurement centre in the grain marketing yard at Fatehpur.

As per Raj Kumar Bhardwaj, secretary of the APMC, Kangra, the wheat purchase at the MSP of Rs 1,975 per quintal is in progress at these procurement centres and will continue till June 15. He says that till May 26, the FCI had procured 23,475 quintals of wheat and this figure was likely to touch 50,000 quintals by mid June. He adds that the farmers are getting online payment for their produce sold at these procurement centres directly in their bank accounts within 48 hours. He claims in the past, small and marginal farmers in lower Kangra areas faced difficulties in selling their paddy, maize and wheat crops in the absence of buyers. They had to resort to distress sale to private players outside the state.