Rice millers demanding additional prices: Farmers

KAKINADA: Civil Supplies Minister Karumuri Nageswara faced an embarrassing situation from the farmers on Monday when he went to Nachugunta village in Unguturu mandal of Eluru district.

Telugu Desam chief Nara Chandrababu Naidu had gone to the village recently and consoled the farmers there.

On Monday, the minister went to the same village, took stock of the paddy reaps and interacted with the farmers. The farmers posed several questions to the minister about paddy procurement by governmental agencies. They alleged that the millers have collected money from them to purchase the paddy but the officials did not help them.

The farmers also said that they have not been provided gunny bags to transport the paddy to the RBKs or rice mills and they had to bear the expenses.

The minister expressed his displeasure over the way he was questioned by the farmers. He phoned the millers and asked them to immediately repay the money they took from farmers. He asked the civil supplies corporation district manager to list out such farmers and take steps to re-pay their money from the farmers.
The minister said 12 rice mills have been seized on the charge of violating the guidelines in paddy purchase and that the government would not spare anybody who cheats farmers.

Later, the minister went to Nandamuru and Krishnayapalem villages in Tadepalligudem in West Godavari district. There, the endowment minister and deputy chief minister Kottu Satyanarayana were present.

Nageswara Rao said Rs 850 crore has been paid to the farmers during this rabi season and paddy is being purchased from farmers without the interference of mediators and rice millers.

The minister said that he along with the agriculture commissioner and district joint collector visited Aakuteegalapadu village recently and the farmers told them that the government has credited the amounts to them towards the paddy sale.

He said that TD leader Chandrababu Naidu as CM did not give input subsidies or other incentives to the farmers. Two farmers had been killed by the police at Kaldari during Chandrababu’s tenure, he said.

Home minister Taneti Vanitha told the media in Kovvuru in East Godavari district that Chandrababu Naidu had never given crop insurance or input subsidy to the farmers on time even during the cyclones and other national calamities. But the YSRC government was providing all the relief at the earliest to the farmers, she claimed.