From Our Correspondent
TURA: The Deputy Commissioner’s supply wing in West Garo Hills district has been releasing food grains to the tune of several hundred quintals to those wholesalers who have already been deleted from the government list for the current year.
As many as twenty wholesalers under Tura Sardar Division have benefitted from the alleged illegal action on the part of the Supply department by managing to get a total allotment of over 6700 quintals in the just the month of June itself.
Previously, as many as thirty individuals were appointed by the government as wholesalers for the Tura Sardar Division. These dealers were given monthly allotments of Above Poverty Line (APL), Below Poverty Line (BPL) and Antyodaya Anna Yojna (AAY) food grains which in turn were to be supplied to fair price shops for sale under the public distribution system (PDS).
However, there was much unhappiness among many senior wholesale dealers over the large number of agents being appointed for a single area such as Tura. Some of the senior wholesale dealers abandoned the government allotment given the limited margin of profit.
In view of this, the West Garo Hills Deputy Commissioner (Supply) issued a fresh order on April 24, in continuation of the Suuply Director’s letter, which clearly mentioned that for the year 2012 there will be ten individuals who have been nominated by the government as wholesale dealers in PDS. The DC (Supply) order states, “In continuation of Director’s letter No. DSCA. 112/2011/10, Date 18.4.12 and in pursuance to the provision on Clause 3 of the Meghalaya Food Grains (PDS) Control Order 2004, the following persons are approved as Government Nominees/agents in PDS for the year 2012 in Tura Sardar Division.”
Despite the order having been given out close to two months ago, the previous group of wholesale suppliers continued to be provided with the government quota of food grains indicating that the Supply department was in itself violating its very own order.
For the month of June the allotment is a staggering 9925.5 quintals for the three varies of food grain supply- APL rice totaling a whopping 4924 quintals, BPL rice 3052.35 quintals, and AAY rice 1949.15 quintals.
This allotment is shared not just by the ten genuine wholesalers but twenty others who have managed to get their share allegedly due to the ‘guidance’ of someone from within the government itself who has so far succeeded in throwing caution to the winds to keep in good humour those deprived from this year’s list of selected dealers.