Ongole: 31 held, police seize PDS rice worth 1.09 crore
Prakasam SP Siddharth Kaushal addressing the media in Ongole on Saturday
Ongole: Prakasam district police conducted 162 raids on rice mills and registered 16 cases on Friday after seizing 4358 quintals of PDS rice and arresting 31 people in relation to the illegal processing of rice at various mills and exporting the bags through seaports.
Addressing a press conference here on Saturday evening, SP Siddharth Kaushal explained that the CI of Inkollu Althaf Hussain received information about the smuggling of PDS rice and after receiving permission from the superiors, he raided Vijayasai Krishna Rice Mill at Valaparla village in Martur mandal, along with the SIs of Martur and Yaddanapudi, M Siva Kumar, and GV Chowdary and their staff.
They seized a lorry with registration number AP16TY7119 with a load of 600 bags of PDS rice and another 1,260 bags of PDS rice in the rice mill. Based on the information available, the SP said that he ordered the police officials in the district to conduct similar raids on the rice mills and PDS stock points in various places. The police officials conducted 162 raids and seized a total of 8,716 bags of PDS rice, roughly weighing about 4,358 quintals and worth Rs 1.09 crore.
In the inquiry, the police found that the brokers were collecting the PDS rice at Rs 12 per kg from the public and they were selling them to the millers at Rs 14 per kg. After recycling the rice, they were handing them over to the exporters and merchants at Rs 20 per kg, who sell them at Rs 36 per kg in the open market or export the same through the ports at Krishnapatnam in Nellore district, Chennai in Tamil Nadu, Panvel in Maharashtra and Rayagada in Odisha and also export to Africa, Dubai, Singapore and Malaysia.
In the raids, the police seized empty branded bags, punching machines, weighing machines, ink, stencil plates, and other articles. The SP appreciated the CI of Inkollu Altaf Hussain, SI of Martur M Siva Kumar, SI of Yaddanapudi GV Chowdary, HCs Vasantha Rao, K Narasimha Rao, PC D Rajesh, HGs Nagoor, Prabhakar, Venkaiah and all others in the district who participated in the raids.