Task Force formed to crack whip on seed mafia

Gadwal: With thousands of farmers being taken for a ride by the seed mafia in Gadwal district for many years, the district police under the leadership of Rema Rajeshwari, Superintendent of Police, has decided to root out the spurious and fake seed firms.

As part of the drive, the SP has formed two special Task Force teams to bust the firms selling spurious seeds to the gullible farmers. Within a span of just 30 days, the Task force teams seized more than eight quintals of fake seeds. “Gadwal is known for growing seeds for various crops like cotton, maize, groundnut and paddy. In fact, the district is also termed as seed bowl of Telangana State.

However, the district has been infested with large number of unregistered and spurious seed sellers who are selling outdated seeds stocked for many years to the poor farmers. Because of this, the illiterate farmers are being duped and they in turn are facing huge losses,” informed Rema Rajeshwari, Superintendent of Police Gadwal.

At present there are two taskforce teams that are keeping a strict vigil on fake seed sellers in the district. The first team takes care of Gadwal circle, while the second team is keeping a vigil in Alampur circle. The taskforce teams comprise members from the police, Agriculture, Marketing and Revenue Departments.

Recently the task force team comprising Venkataiah, head constable, constables Pedda Swami and Nazir along with Harshavardhan, Assistant Divisional Officer, Bhavani and Bhaskar, Agriculture Officers and Rajinikanth Reddy, Village Revenue Officer, raided a poultry farm shed at Jampally village in Dharur mandal and seized 3.5 quintals of fake seeds worth Rs 2 lakh, the police said.

The modus operandi of fake seed mafia is that they usually procure normal cotton seeds and stock it in their sheds and during the cropping season they send the stocked seed to Karnataka and dip the seeds into the acid and chemicals and later get them back packed in attractive covers and sell it to the gullible farmers at exorbitant rates.

On a tip-off, the task force also conducted another raid recently in Sompuram village in Dharur mandal and seized 4.5 quintals of fake seeds and booked cases against the culprits. The task force is not only cracking the whip on the fake and spurious seed dealers but it is also keeping an eye on the shops selling fertilisers, pesticides and ginning mills in the district. “We are not leaving anyone. Our main endeavour is to eradicate the fake seed mafia in the district.

Wherever we find suspicious activity of selling fake seeds or pesticides or fertilisers we are immediately securing the samples and sending it for testing. If found fake and spurious we are seizing the stocks and booking cases against them,” said the SP.