BJP demands joint parliamentary committee to monitor food storage

PALWAL - The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday demanded formation of a joint parliamentary committee to monitor food storage management through the Food Corporation of India (FCI).

The BJP’s demand came after a high-level delegation led by senior leader Rajnath Singh visited two FCI warehouses in Haryana’s Palwal District.

Singh claimed that the country has lost thousands of tonnes of wheat because of mismanagement by the FCI.

The FCI is responsible for procurement and maintenance of stocks of food-grains in the country.

Interacting with the media, Singh said: “After inspecting the godown, I saw that hundreds of thousands of wheat bags are lying in the open. The bags contain rotten wheat. Not to talk about humans, even animals don’t like to eat such food.”

Singh added that there is ample stock of food-grains at the godowns, against the buffer stock requirement. According to party officials, the country has 45.3 million tonnes of wheat against its requirement of 20 million tonnes.

Singh also accused the government of not releasing the extra stock, and demanded a joint parliamentary committee to monitor food management at different godowns.

“The Speaker and Chairperson of both Houses of Parliament, must form a parliamentary committee to monitor the condition of food godowns, and such committee must present a report in the Parliament on how much wheat is lying in open conditions in godowns,” Singh said.

During last fiscal, the FCI procured 28.34 percent of total paddy production and 23.08 percent of total wheat production of the country.(ANI)