Sindh

Illegal commissions: Farmers accuse food dept of taking bribes for wheat bags

SCA president says growers being forced to sell crop for low rates in the open market.

Our Correspondent March 30, 2015

The Sindh government set the wheat procurement target at nine million tons in 2015. PHOTO: REUTERS

HYDERABAD: Farmers have alleged that the Sindh food department is taking bribes for the delivery of gunny bags used to hold wheat grain for sale.

During a Sindh Chamber of Agriculture (SCA) meeting on Sunday, farmers’ representatives claimed that wheat growers were being deprived of millions of rupees due to the illegal bribes being charged for the bags.

According to the SCA, the provincial government announced the free distribution of 24 million bags of 100kg and 48 million bags of 50kg from March 1 but the process has yet to start officially. Instead, the food department officials and staff were asking commissions of Rs400 and Rs200 respectively to illegally sell the 100kg and 50kg bags.

The Sindh government set the wheat procurement target at nine million tons in 2015. The official wheat procurement centres were supposed to start the purchasing process from March 1 but have yet to open. “Our complaints to the food authorities are not being heard,” said SCA president Syed Nadeem Qamar, adding that the situation was forcing wheat farmers to sell their crop for as low as Rs1,050 per 40kg in the open market rather than the government rate of Rs1,350 per 40kg.

“The years 2014 and 2015 are black years for Sindh’s farmers, since they are being forced to sell crop after crop at low rates despite a surge in the cost of cultivation,” farmer leader Zahid Bhurgari said during the meeting.

The participants of the meeting also decided to challenge the government’s tractor scheme in the Sindh High Court. The provincial government spent Rs480 million to subsidise the purchase of 1,600 tractors through the Sindh Bank, which completed the collection of application forms by mid-March and has started the distribution process. The SCA alleged that influential politicians, in connivance with bank officials, were being given the tractors.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 31^st, 2015.