Naveen Patnaik for cheque payment to paddy growers where online fails

BHUBANESWAR: With allegations of farmers facing difficulties in paddy procurement centres due to faults in online payment system, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today asked officials to make payment through cheque wherever required.

"The Chief Minister has ordered for making immediate online payments to farmers for paddy procured from them and in the event of snags in the online system, payments should be immediately done through cheques," Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister Sanjay Dasburma told reporters after the Chief Minister held a high-level meeting on the matter.

Dasburma said the Chief Minister has also ordered for action and surprise visit to paddy procurement centres by the officers.

"The Chief Minister has asked Food Supply Department officials to make surprise visits to mandis to take stock of the situation there," he said.

The high-level meeting is significant in the face of reports of paddy procurement being stalled in Bargarh district due to an online flaw.

Paddy procurement in 118 market yards of the Regulated Market Committees ( RMC) of Bargarh, Atabira and Padampur in the district was stalled due to online flaws, resulting in lakhs of paddy bags lying under the open sky in the market yards of the district for 10-15 days.

Also, there were reports of farmers facing difficulties due to a standoff between groups and the state government over procurement quantities fixed by the government from irrigated and non-irrigated lands in the southern districts of Koraput and Nabarangpur.

In this kharif season, paddy procurement has been started in 12 districts and in this month, the exercise would be done in 15 other districts, the minister said, adding that next month, farmers in remaining districts could sell their paddy in market yards.