Centre refuses to purchase parboiled rice, insists for raw rice supply

Hyderabad: Sticking to its guns, the union government on Monday reiterated that the Food Corporation of India (FCI) was only prepared to purchase raw rice from the State given the national market demand. It made it clear that the parboiled rice could not be procured as requested by the Telangana government. The announcement came in […]

Hyderabad: Sticking to its guns, the union government on Monday reiterated that the Food Corporation of India (FCI) was only prepared to purchase raw rice from the State given the national market demand. It made it clear that the parboiled rice could not be procured as requested by the Telangana government.

The announcement came in the wake of Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao setting a 24-hour deadline to the Central government on paddy procurement. The Centre refused to change its tune and said the FCI had enough stocks of parboiled rice for three years. This could only complicate the ongoing row between the union and the State governments further.

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Speaking to mediapersons in Delhi, union Food and Public Distribution Secretary Sudhanshu Pandey said the paddy procurement in Telangana under the central pool has increased tremendously over the last five to six years. He said due to increased production in parboiled consuming States, the Centre was able to move only 20 lakh tonnes of parboiled rice from surplus States to deficit States.

The IAS officer maintained that the Telangana government had given it in writing that it would not supply parboiled rice to the Central pool in future. He also stated that the Telangana government was yet to send its paddy procurement proposals for the Rabi (Yasangi) season 2021-22, despite the repeated requests from the union government. “We are still waiting for proposals on procurement of raw rice from Rabi season,” the Secretary said.

Further, the FCI clarified that the union government has not put any restriction on procurement of Rabi paddy in Telangana, but had only advised the State government to deliver only raw rice, due to excess stock availability of parboiled rice.

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