The arrival of red chilli into the market yard here has touched 8.70 lakh quintals so far in the current season even as heavy arrivals into the yard continued for the second consecutive day on Tuesday.
Over 50,000 bags of chilli produce had arrived in the yard from various parts of the district, adjoining Warangal and Nalgonda districts besides Krishna district of Andhra Pradesh on Tuesday.
The same trend is expected to continue till second week of April.
The popular ''Teja'' variety chilli commanded a price of Rs. 12,000 per quintal, say sources in the Khammam Agricultural Market Yard.
Even as thousands of chilli bags lying scattered all over the premises of the market yard, the local residents continue to grapple with the problem of pungent smell being emitted from the chilli stocks.
The district administration has earlier mooted shifting of the chilli market yard to a suitable place away from the core area of the town.
But, some organisations representing the hamali workers and other stakeholders opposed the move citing its "negative impact" on their livelihood.
However, the proposal came into spotlight during Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s visit to Khammam in February this year.
The government departments concerned have reportedly identified around 20 acres of land at Gurralapadu village in Khammam rural mandal for relocating the chilli market yard to a suitable place away from residential locality, sources said.
Water is being sprayed twice a day to minimise the problem of spicy odour in the vicinity of the chilli market yard, says S Vinod Kumar, Assistant Director, Marketing Department, Khammam.
The present trend of good arrivals to the market yard is expected to continue till Sri Rama Navami festival in April, he says,.
He also said that arrangements were in place to ensure drinking water and other amenities to the farmers at the market yard.
