Only 10 per cent of paddy purchase centres open in Khammam district

Khammam: State government has opened only about 10 percent of its proposed 236 paddy procurement centres in Khammam district on Thursday. But because of tussle between state and centre over who will procure paddy produced during Rabi season, farmers have already sold 30 percent of their produce to millers and traders.

Procurement of paddy by state government in Khammam district formally commenced with transport minister P. Ajay Kumar inaugurating the purchasing centre at Manchukonda in Raghunathapalem mandal on Thursday.

Paddy had been raised over 98,000 acres in Khammam district against 2.29 lakh acres in the previous Yasangi season after state government discouraged people from cultivating paddy, as centre would not procure the same. As a result, only two lakh quintals of paddy is expected to arrive in markets of the district. Paddy produced in Sattupalli and Vemsoor mandals has already been lifted by traders from Andhra Pradesh.

Farmers’ leader B. Rambabu said TRS government had wasted time by organising stirs against NDA government at the centre over lifting of paddy. Because of this, paddy raised early on 10,000 acres under Palair channel and Ramadasu Lift Irrigation Project in Kusumanchi, Nelakondapalli, Mudigonda and Khammam Rural has already been sold to millers and traders. Farmers under Wyra and Lankasagar projects too reaped the crop early and have sold it off.

N. Narayana, a paddy farmer from Kusumanchi, wondered why state and central governments made a mess over lifting of paddy.

Khammam District Rice Millers Association district president Bomma Rajeswara Rao said farmers had started selling their produce from the last week of March. He maintained that traders and millers had paid the minimum support price of ₹ 1,960 per quintal of paddy.