Baghel appeals MPs to exert pressure on Centre

Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel has appealed to BJP Members of Parliament (MPs) and other BJP leaders of state to mount pressure on the central government for procuring rice from state in central pool.

Baghel while talking to reporters before leaving for the national capital on Sunday evening, said the BJP leaders of state keeping in view of the larger interests of state and of state farmers should urge the Centre for procuring rice from Chhattisgarh.

“Earlier too I had tried to unite the state leaders to come forward in interests of farmers but with an excuse of not getting invite in time, the BJP leaders stayed away from the meeting called by the state government”, Baghel said.

He further reiterated that with a cause which is in interests of the state, the BJP leaders should jointly make effort and urge the Prime Minister for relaxing the rules and allow us to procure paddy at higher support price. 

Notably, The state had set a target of procuring 85 lakh metric ton of paddy from state farmers and around half of it would be needed by it for distributing in Public Distribution System. Congress government in state is actually of the view that if remaining half is purchased by Centre under central pool it would be a great help.

According to information it is expected that there would be a financial burden on the state exchequer of       Rs  7500 crore in procuring paddy from state farmers.

In such a case if Centre agrees to procure rice and permits to deposit it in Food Corporation of India’s (FCI) godown by relaxing its policy as it was done previous year then on one hand the state would be relived from making arrangement of storage of surplus rice but would also its financial burden would also be halved.

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