Centre urged to release 4,000 cr
Amaravati/Delhi: Minister for Civil Supplies Kodali Nani requested the Union government to release dues of Rs 4,000 cr to the State on Tuesday. Nani met Union Minister for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Ram Vilas Paswan in New Delhi on Tuesday.
According to an official press release from the Secretariat here, Nani urged the Centre to release dues worth Rs 4,000 crore to the AP Civil Supplies Department. The dues were pending since 2013.
The Union Minister responded positively to the State government's plea for release of the funds. Nani also asked the Union Minister to increase the space of FCI godowns in the State. Paswan assured to look into the issue. He asked to allow the rice to be shipped from AP to the southern States including Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
Nani informed the Union Minister that the pilot project of distributing quality rice to the poor was launched in Srikakulam district. The State government aimed to distribute quality rice to people in all the districts from coming April. The State government was spending about Rs 1,409 crore on the project, he added.
The quality of rice being supplied to the poor in the State increased significantly. Broken rice has been reduced from 25 per cent to 15 per cent. Nani asked for exemption of GST on by-products of rice. The State Civil Supplies Department set up grain procurement centres to remove the middlemen system.
Later speaking to the media in New Delhi, Nani said that the Centre had identified only 92 lakh ration cards and asked the Union Minister to identify a total of 1.30 crore cards in the State and requested to set up godowns to store rice purchased from farmers.
Stating that the State Assembly's resolution to abolish the Legislative Council was forwarded to the Centre, he said the Central government would take a decision on the issue within two to three months. Nani said instead of providing valuable suggestions to the State government, the Legislative Council was hindering the development of the State.