Following widespread criticism over functioning of some of the Direct Purchase Centres (DPC), Collector S. Aneesh Sekhar warned of stern action against people who intervened in their functioning, here on Sunday.
Ahead of harvest of ‘samba’ crop, now in progress, the district administration had opened 42 DPCs. The officials informed that as per the State government’s order, ‘A’ grade variety of paddy would be purchased at ₹2,060 per quintal and ‘C’ grade at ₹2,015.
In the last ‘kuruvai’ season, the district administration opened about 25 DPCs and purchased 17,416 tonnes of paddy from farmers. However, there was criticism from farmers over functioning of DPCs at the grievance redress meetings. The farmers also wanted more DPCs opened in the district.
To look inot these issues, the Collector formed a committee comprising Agriculture Department officials and farmers’ representatives. It was proposed to open DPCs based on crop coverage in a particular region.
In a step forward, the Collector also suggested the farmers to register their names in the e-portal with details such as extent of crop, survey number, name of the farmer and bank account details.
On the one side, farmers could avoid middlemen and secondly delay in purchse could be avoided, he said. Mobile DPCs would also be stationed in villages, based on demand. Intervention in the working of direct purchase centres by unauthorised persons or merchants would be dealt with an iron hand. If the unauthorised persons were found to be interfering repeatedly, they would even be detained under Goondas Act, the Colelctor said.
