Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
* Move aimed at facilitating the farming community
* State overcomes shortage of Urea
* FIR against hoarders of Urea in Ludhiana
* Licenses of 4 Suspended in Jalandhar, 3 in Ludhiana
Chandigarh, In a pro-farmer decision aimed at facilitating the agriculturists to get unabated and hassle free supply of urea in the state, the Punjab Chief Minister Mr. Parkash Singh Badal has asked the officers to enhance the supply of urea to cooperative societies for distributing it amongst the farmers.
Disclosing this here today a spokesperson of the Chief Minister’s Office said that the Chief Minister has asked the officers to ensure maximum supply to the farmers through the cooperative sector so that the farmers could not be exploited by the private traders through the malpractices of hoarding. He asked the department to ensure that 80% of urea from Indian Potash Limited was allotted to Cooperative sector whereas remaining 20% was given to the private traders. Likewise, Mr. Badal had asked the officers to ensure that 70% of Urea supplied from National Fertilizers Limited was supplied to cooperative sector and 30% to the private ones. In the same manner it has been asked to ensure that 100% urea supplied from Krishak Bharti Cooperative was supplied through cooperative sector to ensure that farmers do not face any sort of problem in getting urea.
Concerted efforts on part of Chief Minister have already resulted in enhancement of allocation of urea in Punjab. The state has already received 9.58 lakh tonnes of Urea by January 8, 2015 as compared to the corresponding period of last year in which, the state had received 8.24 lakh tonnes. Now there was no shortage of urea in the state for which constant monitoring was being done by the state Agriculture Department to ensure that farmers do not face any difficulty in this regard.
Acting on the directions of the Chief Minister the state government has taken several initiatives to overcome the scarcity of the Urea in the state. Meanwhile, the Additional Chief Secretary (Development) Mr. Suresh Kumar convened a meeting of the officers related to the supply of urea in the state on January 9 to ensure hassle free supply of urea to the farmers through cooperative societies. It was informed in the meeting that supplies of Urea have been increased to Marked and PACS from 50% to 70% and extensive checking of private urea suppliers was being done by the state government. Tightening noose around the hoarders of Urea, the state government has registered FIR for hoarding of Urea in Ludhiana. Likewise, four licenses have been suspended in Jalandhar and three in Ludhiana.
