Uttam nails BRS lies on paddy auction

Hyderabad: Strongly countering the BRS allegations that the Civil Supplies Corporation was involved in a scam of global tenders for disposing stockpiles of paddy, Civil Supplies Minister N Uttam Kumar Reddy on Monday asserted that the BRS leaders were levelling baseless allegations.

Addressing a press conference at Gandhi Bhavan, he challenged the allegations levelled by the Opposition BRS leaders, including former Minister T Harish Rao, ex-MLA A Jeevan Reddy. Giving a power point presentation, he tried to explain, with comparative figures of auctions and procurement processes between the government and the previous BRS dispensation.

The minister clarified that during the previous government, the TS Rice Millers’ Association had urged to conduct an auction of paddy from Rabi (2022-23) citing the poor quality of paddy. Therefore, the decision to purchase the paddy after auction was made by the BRS and not by the government. "Earlier tender by the BRS government fetched an average price of only Rs 1,702.51/ quintal though the paddy was only three months old. Consequently, the tenders were cancelled and floated again. The second tenders could not materialise as the MCC came into force at the Assembly elections,” he explained.

The minister elaborated that following the formation of the new government, a new committee suggested modalities and oversaw the tender process. Accordingly, tenders were floated and finalised, fetching an average price of Rs. 2,022.5, although the paddy was nine months old. He cited various reasons, including stock accumulation, poor quality, preventing stocks damage as the reasons for calling tenders.

Uttam pointed out that there were major flaws in earlier tenders called by the BRS regime, including failure to differentiate between ‘sanna biyyam’ and ‘doddu biyyam’, which was rectified in latest tender. He said the average gain per metric tonne compared to the previous tender is Rs 1,110.51 crore. “Therefore, from the auction of 34,59,000 MTS of paddy, the government is expected to generate a revenue of Rs 6,996.06 crore, while the amount was just Rs 5,885.55 crore,” he asserted.

The minister reiterated that the corporation was pushed into a debt of Rs 58,000 crore in the past ten years owing to mismanagement by the BRS regime. “On the other hand, the Congress government reduced the same loan by more than Rs. 5,000 crores in a quarter, which is self-evident and shining example of the government's performance,” he added.

Reddy warned of stern action against traders who purchase paddy or other produce below MSP. He said, as against 7,031 procurement centres proposed last year, this year, their number increased to 7,149. Whereas only 233 MT of paddy was procured last year, as of April 14, 269,699 MTs (2.7 LMTs) have been procured so far.