Telangana cotton farmers spend anxious hours after ginning mills stop purchases

The farmers who reached the market yard on Monday were shocked to notice that the traders and Ginning Mill owners had suspended cotton purchases.

Hyderabad: Cotton farmers in the State, who were already distressed, spent several anxious hours on Monday when the Telangana Cotton and Ginning Mills Association stopped buying their produce in protest against implementation of new norms by the Cotton Corporation of India (CCI).

The farmers who reached the market yard on Monday were shocked to notice that the traders and Ginning Mill owners had suspended cotton purchases. There was a lot of unrest among the farmers as a large quantity of cotton arrived at market yards across the State. In some districts, the farmers resorted to protest and demanded that the government resume cotton purchase.

---

However, later with the intervention of Agriculture Minister Thummala Nageswara Rao and marketing department officials, the issue was resolved through negotiations with the CCI officials, with cotton purchases resuming towards evening.

On Sunday, the union leaders had decided to stop buying cotton bales to press their demand for the withdrawal of the new norms introduced by the CCI. They also wrote a letter to union Minister Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and the CCI Chairman and Managing Director informing them about the suspension of cotton purchases in protest against the new norms introduced by the CCI in the purchase of cotton.

The changes brought by the CCI with regard to purchase of cotton two days ago had become a blow to both mills and farmers. As per the new policy, the mills in a district would be assigned a serial number like L1, L2, L3 and divided them into clusters and only after completion of capacity purchases in the first mill, purchases in other mills would be taken up. Till then there will be no purchases in the rest of the mills. This was not accepted by the Association and they wanted the CCI to withdraw the new rule and continue the old practice.

Citing the example of the Nalgonda district, the association members stated there were 23 ginning mills in the district and purchases were being made in only 7 mills. Due to this, the farmers in the rest of the mills had to come to these seven mills. Thus the burden of transportation was falling on the farmers. Ginning mills and farmers had been demanding that this new policy be withdrawn.

The ginning mill owners alleged that the CCI officials had introduced the new norms to avoid the burden of cotton purchase.”We are opposing CCI’s decision to allow the purchase of cotton in only a few mills. There was a risk of closure of the rest of the mills. Similarly, the farmers have to bear the transportation costs and bring the cotton to the mills in other areas. This decision should be withdrawn immediately. Similarly, the humidity level should also be relaxed,” Bommineni Ravinder Reddy, President of the State Ginning Mills Association said.

The farmers criticised the State government for not taking measures to rescue them. They alleged that Tummala Nageswara Rao completely failed in ensuring smooth purchase of cotton bales and support price to the cotton farmers.