THANJAVUR: Despite setting a target of procuring 2,500 tonnes of black gram under the price support scheme (PSS), regulated markets in the district didn’t procure a single kilogram of the pulse crop during the stipulated 90-day period that ended on June 29. While farmers blame the “high” quality parameters for their harvest going unsold, officials suspect the poor quality seeds the former buy led to the situation.
According to officials of the agriculture and farmers’ welfare department, around 12,000 hectares in the district came under black gram cultivation during the rice-fallow season that commenced in January 2025. To help farmers avoid distress sales of their crop, which they commenced harvesting in April, the Thanjavur district marketing committee had made arrangements from April 1 to procure the pulse crop at the minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 74/kg at the regulated markets functioning at Thanjavur, Kumbakonam, Papanasam and Orathanadu.
During the 90-day procurement period that ended on June 29, not a single kg of black gram, however, was procured under the PSS scheme which was implemented by the state agricultural marketing and agriculture business department on behalf of the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd (NAFED). When contacted the officials overseeing the regulated markets said the quality parameters fixed by the NAFED are “very high”.
Though we could arrange for winnowing to remove foreign particles from the grain, issues like discolouration of grain remained. Hence we could not procure the farmers’ harvest, officials added. They also suspect that private traders sell poor quality seeds of the crop to farmers. Villappan Sundar, a farmer from Ko Vallundampattu, said officials often reject farmers’ black gram harvest saying it has more brown coloured grains. "However the Kumbakonam marketing committee officials arranged for selling my black gram harvest to a private trader at MSP," Sundar added.
As per NAFED guidelines listed in their website, pulses shall have reasonably uniform size, shape and colour. Pulses shall be sweet, clean, wholesome and free from mould, weevils, obnoxious smell, discoloration, admixture of deleterious substances -- including added colouring matter -- and all other impurities except to the extent fixed.
The moisture level should be below 12%. The maximum allowed foreign matter per quintal of the harvest is 2%, admixture, 3%, damaged pulses, 3%, slightly damaged pulses, 4%, immature and shrivelled pulses 3% and weevilled pulses, 4%.