Faridkot
The commission agents from grain market Kotkapura have written to the DC Faridkot seeking her intervention to speed up the lifting of the wheat from the yard,saving the glut like situation and harassment of the farmers and ahartias.
The commission agents association,in a letter,addressed to the DC,DFSC and DMO Faridkot have alleged that the FCI is not accepting the procured wheat stock at the silos saying that the quality of the procured wheat is below the specifications.
"The commission agents are not at fault in any case.Rather,it rained very heavily at night of April 9 all of sudden and it led to some damage to the wheat filled in gunny bags.Though we took utmost care to protect the gunny bags from getting wet by covering those with turpiolines,yet the moisture content increased and led to a little damage to the wheat,as some grains got wet.But this is not our fault.We had duly cleaned,weighed and stitched dry and quality produce.However,the weather conditions are beyond our control,"said Ashok Kumar Goel,President of Ahartia Association Kotkapura.
The commission agents further said that as there is no proper drainage system laid in the Kotkapura yard,the rain water rushes to the low areas of the yard,particularly along the roadsides within yard and runs under the unloaded or stocked produce leading to the wetting of grains there.
"The weather conditions have been very adverse this season and farmers and commission agents are already facing losses due to it.The non lifting of the produce after procurement is a crude joke by the concerned agencyy with the farmers and commission agents,"alleged Ashok Goel.
"Nearly 6-7 lakhs of gunny bags are yet to be lifted from the main yard of Kotkapura grain market besides some other yards in rural areas.30 to 35 per cent produce is yet to arrive in the grain market. Now the weather is clear and when we fill up the gunny bags of the procured produce going through cleaning,weighing and stitching, yet any unpredicted rainfall may again lead to the damage to the procured produce. This happened earlier. We tried a lot to dry up the wet gunny bags by reshuffling and restocking them, but some damage was inevitable.But this damage is too less. Even if there are 5-6 bags with higher moisture content or some cake formation is in them, all the truck load of 700 gunny bags is returned. We have to pay the fare of transport twice in this case while we don't have any fault," said Goel.
"All blame is being shifted to us, while we are not at any fault," the commission agents said.
The commission agents further alleged that there are daily specials loaded from other grain markets, but little produce is being transported from grain market Kotkapura, which is one of the largest. More than one special need to be dispatched from here to help reduce the glut of the produce.
Goel said that if their problems are not resolved,they would be forced to protest in more ways.