Urea Shortage in the State; Farmers Form Long Procurement Queues
- Long queues by farmers were witnessed in Singoli on Sunday.
- Farmers were sold Urea fertilized along with compost and weed killer for RS 750.
- Shortage of Urea has been reported in the state since long.
Singoli, Madhya Pradesh: Despite efforts by the administration to eradicate Urea crises, farmers are still seen lodging queues to procure the nitrogen-based fertilizer from local vendors. On Sunday, huge crowd to collect urea bags was seen at several outlets across the Singoli district.
An excerpt from a conversation with a distributor named Lokesh Patwa, revealed that the farmers were given two bags per Aadhar card at Rs 265. Along with this farmer were also asked to purchase a Urea compost bag for Rs 375 and a packet of weed killer worth Rs 110, which summed up to Rs 750.
The Northern states from the past few months have been reporting shortage of urea ahead of the Rabi sowing season. Farmers have been resorting to protests and blocking national highways staging their anger against the administration. The centre recently approved an additional subsidy of Rs 28,655 crore paid to the fertiliser companies for selling their products below market prices. The fertilizer crises gained huge mileage politically as the ruling party slapped remarks on opposition for creating trouble with rumours.
Earlier in the month of October CM Shivraj Singh Chauhan in a cabinet meeting confirmed a stock of 2.5 lakh tonnes received by the state for the Rabi season. Reports of illegal hoarding and supply of sub-standard fertilizers in DAP bags also surfaced which was addressed by stringent national security Act against businessman for black marketing.
