Gandhinagar: Fresh procurement of groundnut at support price has been halted by government following NAFED complain to Centre about mixing of dust, soil, stones in groundnut procured by cooperatives such as GUJCOMASOL, GUJCOT and others.

So far Rs 3,539 crore groundnut stock has been procured from 4.15 lakh farmers in Gujarat for which Rs 3,103 crore payment has been done directly to farmers’ bank accounts. Process is on for payment of rest Rs 536 crore by NAFED. Against 33 lakh mt groundnut production, te government of India arm NAFED had hired five agencies in Gujarat for purchase of 8 lakh mt groundnut. Due to scams emerged during the process, procurement was stopped at 261 cooperative societies run centres. Later the Gujarat government was permitted to purchase 1 lakh mt of total 4 lakh additional permitted stock of groundnut by centre before February 10. However it has not begun so far in view of scams.

DeshGujarat