Punjab rice millers to protest if AGA not adopted

The Rice Millers Association (RMA), Punjab, on Wednesday, alleged corruption in the Food Corporation of India (FCI) and demanded a CBI inquiry.

Addressing a press conference, RMA president Tarsem Saini told that the FCI headquarters have directed all its centres, particularly in Punjab, to use automatic grain analyser (AGA) for quality control (QC), but the local FCI office insisted on manual check.

He added that in Faridkot, a rice miller faced harassment for days as the QC staff initially accepted the AGA report, but failed the samples citing fresh standard operating procedures (SOP) in which it was desired that out of 25% of total stock, 5% will be checked manually and the remaining 20% through AGA.

“While sampling, the damage percentage was 2.2% on AGA, but on manual checking it was 3.6%,” said Saini. Similarly, in another consignment, damage percentage was 2.19%, while on manual inspection it was reported as high as 4.45%, he added.

The rice millers called for 100% use of AGA and have also demanded the withdrawal of SOP.

Bharat Bhushan Binta, another office bearer of the association said threatened stir if the demand to shift to manual system is accepted.

An Assistant General Manager level official in the regional office of FCI added that the system of manual QC was adopted on the directions of Delhi headquarters but refused to comment on the allegations. Meanwhile, all attempts to reach the FCI General Manager in Punjab were futile.

This article has been republished from The Hindustan Times.