Wheat buying : ‘I sold 65,000 bags to connected men but was still suspended’

Suspended employee concedes compulsion in obliging elected representatives, such as senators, MNAs, MPAs and advisers.


Sarfaraz Memon May 03, 2011

SUKKUR:


The Sukkur district food controller was suspended on Monday on charges of selling wheat bags to middlemen instead of farmers.


Syed Chungal Shah used to hold the same position in Jacobabad until recently when he was transferred to Sukkur following allegations that he was selling seed and fertiliser to middlemen instead of growers. In Sukkur, Shah was once again accused of selling wheat bags to middlemen. For his part, Shah said that he has given more than 65,000 gunny bags to the men of elected representatives but they were demanding more. “They couldn’t wait for even a day or two, and had me suspended,” he complained.

According to him, “it has become very difficult for government officers to work with honesty” since elected representatives, such as senators, MNAs, MPAs and advisers, are asking for favours and “we are compelled to do as told”.

Another food department official told The Express Tribune, on condition of anonymity, that “our officers are working under immense political pressure because all the elected representatives order us to give a large number of gunny bags to their favourite traders”.

The Express Tribune tried to contact a number of elected politicians but to no avail. According to Shah, the government’s wheat-buying target in Sukkur district was 750,000 bags last year and this year, despite the bumper crop, the target has been reduced to 650,000 bags. “So far, we have procured 375,000 bags of wheat at 22 centres of the district.”

Sindh Abadgar Board, Kashmore, general secretary G M Khoso accused food officials of massive corruption. He told The Express Tribune that more than 90,000 gunny bags have been given to middlemen, while the growers, who have deposited money to buy these bags, are being cast aside. Jacobabad and Kashmore district food controller, Asghar Naich, denied this allegation. He insisted that the gunny bags are being sold to actual growers.

Nevertheless, Naich accepted that there is political pressure. “What can we do if a grower sells it to the middleman after buying it from the food department?” he added.

In the meantime, growers wait in line for bags as their harvest is turning stale after the rainfall.

The growers, who kept their yield in open spaces, were forced to sell it for as low as Rs830 and Rs850 per 40 kilogrammes, as compared to the government rate of Rs950 per 40 kilogrammes. The buying was scheduled to start from March 20 and, even though buying centres were set up throughout upper Sindh, no work took place until April 10. Then it rained in the last week of March and the first week of April.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 4th, 2011.

COMMENTS (1)

joy | 12 years ago | Reply LOL for a change I thought I was reading a news item about India.....we got so much in common :)
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