Home |Telangana| Piyush Goyal Hits Self Goal On Paddy Procurement
Piyush Goyal hits self goal on paddy procurement
Hyderabad: Union Minister for Food and Public Distribution Piyush Goyal’s attempts to stick to the script that he has been playing out on paddy procurement from Telangana boomeranged on him when he called up the railway and FCI authorities to arrange for rakes and make arrangements to lift rice stocks immediately from godowns. This comes […]
Hyderabad: Union Minister for Food and Public Distribution Piyush Goyal’s attempts to stick to the script that he has been playing out on paddy procurement from Telangana boomeranged on him when he called up the railway and FCI authorities to arrange for rakes and make arrangements to lift rice stocks immediately from godowns. This comes hours after he asserted in a press conference that the State had failed to supply 27 lakh tonnes of pending rice to FCI.
The Union Minister, whenever questioned about paddy procurement from Telangana, always sought to blame the State government, stating that it was yet to release the pending rice stocks as per an agreement reached with FCI without once bothering to clarify Telangana’s categorical statement that FCI was refusing to take the rice stock citing godown space shortage. On Tuesday, however, Piyush Goyal, under persistent demand from a delegation of Ministers and elected representatives that met him, was forced to call up railway and FCI authorities to do the needful to clear the stocks lying in FCI godowns to make way for supply of the pending rice stock for Yasangi 2020-21.
The Union Minister, who failed to give any clarity on the enhancement of rice procurement targets for Vaanakalam season, however, assured the delegation that he would get back on the subject after discussing the issue with officials “in a couple of days”. The delegation comprising Ministers S Niranjan Reddy, Errabelli Dayakar Rao, G Jagadish Reddy, Gangula Kamalakar and V Prashanth Reddy and MPs categorically told Piyush Goyal that they will stay put in the national capital till a letter of assurance on enhanced procurement was handed over to them.
At the press conference earlier along with Union Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy, Piyush Goyal, referring to lack of rakes and storage space in FCI godowns, said there was no such problem and the State must supply the agreed quantity of grain instead of making allegations. He claimed that he had not received any such request from the State government to lift the rice. Later, he admitted that the TRS Ministers did take up the issue earlier and he had immediately arranged for rakes and moved the material, but evaded any direct answers.
Ahead of his meeting with the Telangana delegation, the Union Minister had a meeting with Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP leaders from Telangana including MPs, MLAs and other leaders. In what appeared to be a politically motivated press conference held at his office in Udyog Bhavan later on, he was accompanied by Union Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy, MPs D Arvind, and MLA Eatala Rajender as well as BJP national vice-president DK Aruna, former MPs G Vivek, Jithender Reddy, Vijayashanthi and others.
Speaking on the occasion, Piyush Goyal sought to take credit for the progress of farmers in Telangana. He said paddy and rice procurement from Telangana increased three-folds in the last five years, while the Minimum Support Price increased by 1.5 times. As a result, farmers of Telangana were getting five times additional benefits after Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power. “The Centre agreed to procure an additional 20 lakh tonnes of parboiled rice grown in last year’s Rabi season as a special gesture although the country did not require this additional quantity. We had also repeatedly given extensions to the State government for the delivery of rice over last one year,” he said.
On the issue of parboiled rice, Goyal said that FCI had enough stocks to meet the demand for four years and the MoU with the State clearly says that FCI’s purchase of rice for the Central pool will depend on the demand in the rest of the country. He made it clear that the Centre will not procure parboiled rice in the Yasangi procurement season of 2021-22 and the Telangana government had given a written commitment earlier not to deliver parboiled rice to the FCI in future. He further said that there was no issue in the purchase of raw rice and FCI had significantly increased purchases from the State.
Further, the Union Minister expressed anger over the Telangana Ministers for arriving in Delhi on Saturday when he was out of the station and accusing him of not giving an appointment. “We are all busy with our work. Who asked them to come and sit here for last two days when I was out of station. Don’t they have any work? Don’t they want to serve people of ‘AP’ (probably meant Telangana)?” he asked.
Now you can get handpicked stories from Telangana Today onTelegrameveryday. Click the link to subscribe.