Farmers in Garhwa fear that they will have to face a chaotic situation due to the opening of fewer paddy purchasing centers in Garhwa district. Out of 189 PACS in the district, only 34 were given permission to purchase paddy.
On the other hand, the Food and Civil Supply Department, Jharkhand has announced the date for start paddy procurement from December 15. However, according to farmers, if the preparation of the district administration does not improve, they may have to face a chaotic situation while selling paddy again. Paddy is to be procured this time through PACS. There are total 189 PACS in Garhwa district, but out of these, only 34 PACS have been decided to be procuring paddy, impractical in many big blocks, where only one pack is allowed to be purchased. In such a situation, the farmers will have to face many serious problems to sell their paddy.
“If the district administration wants to open paddy purchasing centers in all 189 panchayats of 20 blocks of the district, it can purchase the total paddy produced by the farmers in one and two months. But, with the opening of paddy purchasing centers in only 34 panchayats, the problem of farmers will increase. For example, in the Meral block of the district, which has 20 panchayats, only one PACS has been allowed to buy paddy. This paddy purchasing center is located about 10 km away from the block headquarter in Viktam village,” said a farmer.
Sources said that according to the geographical structure of Meral Block, at least five panchayats should have a paddy purchasing centre. The farmers will have to bear the loss of thousands of rupees in the form of rent in transporting the paddy to the only paddy purchasing centre that is approved. And the people of Meral Southern region will have to face trouble in selling, similarly permission has been given to open one paddy purchase centre each in Bhandaria block having 14 panchayats and Ranka block having 14 blocks, similarly four purchasing centers have been allowed in Garhwa block having 22 panchayats. Centres are being opened, whereas more than eight paddy purchasing centres should have been opened here, not a single paddy purchasing center has been allowed to open in the western region of Garhwa block. Due to which the godowns will be filled soon and there will always be a shortage of sacks, due to which the purchase of paddy will always have to be stopped. Farmers may have to wait for several days outside the purchasing center to save from rain and for protection from animals; farmers will also have to face the problem of getting their numbers by keeping the paddy in the barn for months.
Deputy Commissioner Rajesh Kumar Pathak informed that the procurement of paddy would be started in Garhwa district soon, for this action and review is being done with the concerned department.