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Quintals of sugar lie unused as Haryana lacks logistics
Neeraj Mohan
Chandigarh
SUCCUMBING TO the pressure of sugar mafia, the Central government has failed to lift sugar from godowns of Haryana mills that has led to a financial loss.
The sugar mills in the state, both from the private and cooperative sector, have a record production of sugar which has reached 48.70 lakh tonne, registering an increase of 9 lakh mt from 39.19 mt last year. But the problem is similar to wheat as sugar mills find it difficult to stock sugar in the lack of lifting approval by the Centre.
Before the crushing season started in November 2011, all 11 cooperative sugar mills of the state had 7.27 lakh quintals (16% of total production) of sugar. Three private mills had stock of 3.18 lakh quintals in godowns. Thus the state had a stock of 10.45 lakh quintals of sugar (18% of total production) by November.
Following good sugar recovery this year, 21.62 lakh quintal sugar lies in all cooperative mills of Haryana whereas similar situation was witnessed in three private mills, said officials of Harayana State Federation of Cooperative Sugar Mills (HFCSM).
The last release order was issued by National Federation of Cooperative Sugar Factories Limited on 1 April 2012. Now the millers are eagerly waiting for another release order.
“We were already having a stock of more than 42 lakh bags of sugar in our godowns in cooperative mills. We need immediate release order as we cannot keep such huge stock for long,” said a senior official in the HSFCM, requesting anonymity.
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Mills find it difficult to stock sugar in the lack of lifting nod by the Centre |
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Haryana Cooperation Minister Satpal Sangwan told TEHELKA, “It is because of restless efforts by the farmers that all cooperative mills of the state are in profit. However, there is a problem of lifting but we are hopeful that the old stock will be cleared soon”
When contacted SK Sachdeva, Chief Operating Officer, Sarswati Sugar Mills, Yamunanagar said, “As the functioning of the factory stopped last year, we do not have correct calculation of the stock.
However, we got nod to supply 3 lakh quintals sugar to the market by 30 June, but we still have stock of 8.60 lakh quintals exceeding our limit.”
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