Haryana 'bans' paddy coming from other states

KARNAL: Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar today directed state officials to put a complete "ban" on procurement of paddy from others states for the time being as he visited two places here in order to find out the problems faced by the agrarian community.

An official release didn't cite any reason behind the move.

According to a government release, the Chief Minister paid visits at two places here in order to find out the problems faced by the farmers in the state.

During the visit, the Chief Minister directed the officers concerned to procure produce of only Haryana farmers at government rates and for the time being directed to put complete ban on paddy coming from other states.

He also checked eight slips and found that two slips from other states, the release stated.

The Chief Minister was on his way to inaugurate Khadi Gram Udyog Bhawan, but on seeing farmers standing in a long queue outside a seed distribution centre, he stopped there and interacted with them.

He directed the officers concerned to make such arrangements that in future farmers would not have to wait in queues for long to get seeds and other things.

Khattar said that there was no shortage of improved and developed varieties of seed in the state and the government was ensuring provision of new varieties of seeds to farmers, the official release stated.

He also visited grain market and asked the farmers about the problems being faced by them in procurement of paddy.

Giving assurance to the farmers, the Chief Minister said that every single grain of their produce would be procured at government rates.

He urged the farmers to clean and dry their harvest properly before bringing them to the market so that they do not have to face any problems in storage due to high moisture content.

As an experiment, dryer machines have been installed outside 'mandis' which completely removes the moisture content from the crop within three hours.

The Chief Minister himself checked two such machines.