Ministry sold urea to ‘ghost dealers’: NA panel

Dealers may have sold commodity at high rates in black market.

ISLAMABAD:

A parliamentary panel on Thursday disclosed that the Ministry of Industries has sold 68,125 tons of urea over the last five months to “ghost dealers” and the commodity was untraceable, suspecting millions of rupees have been made by selling urea in the black market besides creating its shortage.

The revelation came at the platform of the National Assembly Standing Committee on Commerce, headed by Engineer Khurram Dastgir Khan, of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz.

It could turn out to be a scandal for Senior Industries Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi as the urea was sold during July-November period.

A senior official of National Fertilizer Marketing Limited (NFML) confirmed the presence of ghost dealers, but said the matter was under investigation.

Dastgir Khan said according to a study conducted by the Punjab Agriculture Department 44 per cent of the total urea supply made in Punjab from July through November was untraceable. He said this supply was made to 585 fake dealers. Total supply to dealers in Punjab stood at 154,861 tons.

During the investigation, it was found that the addresses given by these dealers were bogus and there was no trail of the commodity the government imported at high rates and sold at subsidised rates to keep it affordable for farmers.

NFML General Manager Qudrat Ullah said the government sells urea at Rs1,300 per 50kg bag to dealers but imported it at Rs3,000 per bag.

He said the government has constituted a departmental committee to identify the bogus dealers, but the NA committee members raised questions of impartiality, saying the Ministry of Industries cannot conduct a fair inquiry.

According to Dastgir, the fake dealers could have sold the commodity in black at least for Rs1,800 per bag. He said in Mandi Bahauddin out of 59 dealers only seven could be verified. In Attock, 71 per cent of the supply was untraceable while in Pak Pattan the ratio was 52.5 per cent. He said 2,093 dealers were operating in Punjab, of which 1,495 could be verified.

Dastgir said ten members of the National Assembly had obtained urea permits from the Ministry of Industries and made millions of rupees.

Urea smuggling to Afghanistan

The committee also discussed the dumping and smuggling of 78,000 tons of urea in Afghanistan. An FIA official said the agency has sought permission of the interior ministry to register cases against 14 officials of Grade 18 and above, who allegedly facilitated smuggling and took commission worth Rs390 million.

Trading Corporation of Pakistan Chairman Tahir Riaz Naqvi told the committee that the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) has decided to import 300,000 tons of urea in addition to 200,000 tons earlier. This would take the total import quantity to 1.2 million tons for this calendar year.

He said the decision was taken after the petroleum ministry said that gas supply to fertiliser plants would be cut from now onwards.

“Import quantity is sufficient to meet Rabi needs but the delay will affect urea availability,” said Qudrat Ullah. He said December’s requirements are 850,000 tons but domestic production would be only 450,000 tons.

TCP was directed on October 20 to import 700,000 tons of urea. Out of that, 395,758 tons have arrived so far.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 16^th, 2011.