Rice millers are happy after Union Food and Public Distribution System Minister Piyush Goyal assured BJP State President Bandi Sanjay Kumar in New Delhi on Friday that the Centre will resume purchasing custom-milled rice from the State. Otherwise, 93 lakh tonnes of paddy have been lying idle at 3,300 small and large rice mills across the state since June 7 due to the Centre's abrupt halt to custom milling.
As a result, the millers' stocks that had already been handed over by the State government were now vulnerable to damage caused by sprouting from grain, discoloration due to rain, and rodent and monkeys feeding on grain.
The failure of the government to implement the sixth phase of Prime Minister Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana of supply of free rice to the poor to offset the impact of COVID from April to September was the main reason for the halt of milling operations after two months of frantic activity. This occurred after the government drew its quota of 1.90 lakh tonnes of free rice from FCI godowns but did not distribute it in April or May.
The State informed the Centre that it did not carry out distribution due to technical reasons, but that it will compensate by extending the implementation period to October and November.
This was not an isolated incident of procurement halting, as the FCI had conducted physical stock verification at mills in March and May and discovered several irregularities. The millers also did not help with verification by leaving the bags in an "unaccountable position" at 562 mills, making it impossible for the teams to count them.
This was not the first time that rice procurement issues had rocked the state. Earlier this year, the State government clashed with the Centre after the latter refused to lift pre-cooked rice from the husk by steaming. The state government claimed that it could only provide parboiled rice because paddy grown in rabi and milled after April was unfit for producing raw rice in adequate quantities because the milling will result in broken rice of large percentage due to higher temperatures.
Due to the Centre's strict refusal to buy parboiled rice, the State opened thousands of procurement centres in villages in April-May and purchased approximately 50 lakh tonnes of paddy at the minimum support price of Rs 1,960 per quintal. Another 40 lakh tonnes of paddy from the previous two seasons had already been stored at mills.
