The Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) has demanded that the Food Corporation of India (FCI), which is the nodal agency for procurement of paddy/custom-milled rice, lodge a complaint with the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into “a ₹1,100-crore scam in the global tenders” called for the disposal of 35 lakh tonnes paddy and procurement of fine rice.
Addressing a press conference here on Sunday along with two former chairpersons of the State Civil Supplies Corporation – Peddi Sudarshan Reddy and S. Ravinder Singh – and party leaders Ponnala Lakshmaiah and Shambipur Raju, BRS working president K.T. Rama Rao said it was a strange coincidence that the same four agencies/ companies — Kendriya Bhandar, NACOF, Hindustan and LG — had secured both the tenders of paddy purchase and fine rice supply from/to the State Civil Supplies Corporation.
He alleged that the State government/ corporation had invited bids for sale of 35 lakh tonnes of paddy which includes 1.6 lakh tonnes of fine varieties by fixing a price band of ₹1,885 to ₹2,007 per quintal against ₹,2100 per quintal offered by millers in the State. The government had formed a committee on the disposal of paddy stock on January 25, framed guidelines on the same day, eliminated local millers on the turnover criteria and also floated global tenders that day.
The tender norms included lifting of the entire paddy stocks by the successful bidders in 90 days, paying the corporation ₹7,500 crore. However, they had not lifted even 20% of stock so far and instead coerced and threatened the local millers with the help of the government to buy that paddy at ₹2,230 per quintal. The BRS working president alleged that it was boiling down to a scam of about ₹750 crore straightaway.
He mentioned that the previous government had cancelled tenders for the same paddy disposal as the bids quoted were less than ₹2,100 per quintal offered by millers. Further, he noted that Kendriya Bhandar was blacklisted by the State government in the past for its irregularities in the supply of fine rice to the residential educational institutions.
Similarly, in the case of the fine rice procurement, Mr. Rama Rao said that against the open market price of ₹42-₹45 per kg, the corporation had given the contract to the four agencies for the supply of 2.2 lakh tonnes rice to mid-day meal scheme, anganwadis and residential schools and colleges at ₹57 per kg (one agency) and ₹56.9 per kg (three agencies). At ₹15 per kg difference, the scam amounted to about ₹300 crore.
The BRS leader said the tenders were clear violation of PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) provisions and also the Foodgrains Act and Price Control Act. He wondered why the Food Corporation of India was not responding to it though the Floor Leader of BJP in Telangana had also alleged a scam in the two tenders.
