BHUBANESWAR: Even as politics over rising onion price is hotting up with Odisha Pradesh Chhatra Congress on Tuesday resorting to sell the pricey edible bulb near the official residence of Agriculture Minister Ranendra Pratap Swain at one-third of the market price as a mark protest, the state government is yet to respond to the request of the Centre for purchase of the commodity from the buffer stock.
Sources in the Agriculture department said it is the responsibility of the Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare department to place indent to the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution for purchase of perishable commodities not covered under the price support scheme (PSS) during crisis situation.
“As onion price soars across the country, the Ministry has written to the state government to place order to National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation (NAFED) and National Cooperative Consumers Federation (NCCF) for supply of required quantity of onion under market intervention scheme. The department is yet to take a call on it,” they said.
The state government had done market intervention in October 2019 when the onion price breached Rs 80-100 per kg by selling the vegetable through Maitree (fair price) shops in all the district headquarters of the state. “Since the Central government is supplying onion from its buffer at Rs 25 a kg, the FS&CW department could have taken similar steps to provide relief to the consumers. Procurement of 5,000 tonne of onion from the Central pool will cost only Rs 12.5 crore and the effective price to the consumer will be `30 a kg at no profit no loss,” said general secretary of Kuberpuri Merchant Association Shakti Shankar Mishra.
He said the state government has created a corpus of Rs 100 crore under the Price Stabilisation Fund (PSF) to help regulate the price volatility of important agri-horticultural commodities like onion, potatoes and pulses.
“What is the purpose of the PSF if it remained unutilised,” Mishra wondered. He said the five poll-bound states are lifting heavily from buffer stock and ensuring that onion is available to every household at Rs 25 a kg. The additional cost towards transportation, water and handling charges are borne by respective governments. The wholesale price of onion in Bhubaneswar is Rs 50 a kg while the retail prices ranges from Rs 60 to Rs 70 a kg.