The Gaddi Annaram fruit market here witnessed day-long protests by traders and farmers on Monday. They halted the trading in fruits brought by farmers from different parts of Telangana and outside. Officials said the trading community stopped the purchase of mangoes to protest against the cancellation of licenses of many traders.
They were also miffed by the government’s failure to educate them on alternative ways of ripening fruits instead of using harmful calcium carbide.
Support price
The farmers, on the other hand, staged a protest demanding a support price for their produce. They said they got only Rs.30,000 per tonne against the expenditure of Rs.15,000 on cutting and transporting the fruit. “We should get at least Rs.50,000 per tonne for our toil and it's very much possible as the fruit is sold at Rs.100 to Rs.150 a kg by retail traders”, a farmer from Nalgonda district said.
The main cause for the stalemate over trading of mango, however, is traders’ refusal to purchase the stocks due to the cancellation of their licences against pending dues to the market committee. “The officials do not accept the fee/rent although we are ready to clear the dues. They can give a chart on dues from 1990 to 2013 so that we can clear the rent dues”,” a trader said.
Another trader alleged that nobody (officials) was willing to resolve the issue either over dues or providing the alternative ways to ripen fruits – ethylene gas chambers. “As such there is no testing facility in the market to determine whether the gas emanating from the ripening chambers is either acetylene or ethylene and the CFTRI which has the facility will generally take six months to send report on the samples sent by traders on their own”.
Minister for Panchayat Raj and Rural Development Jupally Krishna Rao went to the market to resolve the issue, but in vain. Later, talks were held with traders, farmers and marketing officials by Market Committee Chairman Purushotham Rao, wherein it was agreed that the traders would not use calcium carbine for ripening the fruits and that the officials would make arrangements from ethylene chambers. Trading was then resumed.
