With the weather easing out and witnessing of a bright sunny day ending a three day rainy spell, paddy lifting has commenced in all districts across the State and 18 lakh bags of paddy have been lifted in a single day today.
Disclosing this here today, Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Minister Lal Chand Kataruchak stated that lifting of paddy has been going on smoothly today in all centers of Districts Amritsar, Fazilka, Kapurthala, Ropar, SAS Nagar, Pathankot and Tarntaran, while it commenced in Moga, Fatehgarh Sahib, SBS Nagar, Ludhiana, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Gurdaspur, Boha region of Mansa, Makhu & Mallanwala in Ferozepur, Gidderbaha in Muktsar, Barnala center in Barnala, Sunam, Dhuri & Khanauri in Sangrur.
The Minister further said that seamless procurement operations are State government’s priority and out of a total arrival of 27 LMTs of paddy, nearly 10 lakh MTs has been already lifted and stored in eligible rice mills.
He further added that the State mandies are witnessing arrivals of nearly 1-1.5 Lakh MT of paddy in a day, and almost all paddy arriving in a day gets purchased by the end of that day itself.
As on today, the unsold paddy across the State is less than one day arrival, despite heavy rains in most parts of the State during last 3 days, which he said, clearly shows that in most mandis, paddy is being cleaned and purchased on the date of arrival itself.
All arrangements of Bardana, Mandi labour and transportation are adequate across the state, he said.
Giving details of the MSP payments he said that nearly Rs.5100 crores had already been transferred directly into the accounts of the farmers. He reaffirmed the commitment of the State Government to purchase every single grain produced with the sweat and toil of the farmer.