Hyderabad: Two held for selling spurious cotton seeds

Hyderabad: An interstate racket of selling spurious (BT-3) cotton seeds from Karnataka to Telangana and Andhra Pradesh was busted by the Rachakonda Police Special Operations team with two persons being arrested at Mansoorabad on Monday.

Police seized 15 quintals of spurious cotton seeds from M.Lakshmi Narayana (48), a trader from Kamala Nagar in Mansoorabad and N.Srinivasa Rao (50), from Amaravati in Andhra Pradesh, while one suspect, Narayana Reddy from Karnataka, was absconding.

Rachakonda Police Commissioner Mahesh M.Bhagwat said Lakshmi Narayana and Srinivasa Rao were illegally procuring spurious and banned BT-3 cotton seeds from Karnataka and selling to unsuspecting farmers in Telangana, Maharashtra and Odisha by inducing them that the seeds would give high yields.

A few days ago, the duo purchased spurious seeds at Rs.550 per kg from Narayana Reddy and transported it to Lakshmi Narayana’s house to sell to farmers at Rs.1, 200 per kg, without a valid licence.

Lakshmi Narayana was arrested and had six cases against him for the same crime in 2019 and was also detained under the Preventive Detention Act.

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