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Price rise: State seeks package

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Food Minister C. Divakaran on Tuesday asked the Centre to take over the procurement and distribution of essential commodities. He also demanded that the Centre sanction to the State a special package for checking price rise since Kerala is a consumer State. The State government had already submitted a memorandum to the Centre regarding this. He criticised the Centre for blaming the States for the price rise instead of to solve the problems which triggered it. “The Centre is evading responsibility,” he added. The Minister contended that inflation in the food grains market had risen to 20 per cent last week. Futures and speculative trading controlled the markets. Monopolies continued to rule the retail market. Because of resistance from companies like the Reliance, the public sector agencies were not able to procure food grains and essential commodities from production centres. The Food Corporation of India (FCI) godowns were being converted into centres for them to hoard items. The Centre itself had admitted that 300 districts in the country were in the grip of either drought or flood. Even in this adverse situation, Kerala was distributing 13 items, including sugar, at prices which were 50 to 60 per cent less than that in the open market. The State government had to shoulder an additional burden of Rs.500 crore as a result of it. State’s position According to the Centre’s own survey, Kerala was 17th in the list of States in the grip of price rise. Despite this, the Centre was not prepared to restore the ration rice or wheat quota of Kerala or roll back their revised prices. He asked the Centre to convene a meeting of Food Ministers of the States immediately to discuss the situation.

                                                                                                               
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