Govt to invoke price stabilisation fund to cool pulses' price, says Jaitley

Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday said the principle concern at the moment is prices of daals, especially tur daal, and therefore, the government has decided to invoke price stabilisation fund.

"It is a well known fact that India is a little over two million tons short on production as far as pulses are concern. The shortage is made up by imports. We had a significant amount of imports into the market, but there is even some global shortage that has resulted in escalation of global price of pulses," he said.

"Therefore, to get over the present situation, and keeping the fact that some stocks are already available at the Jawaharlal Nehru Port, the group decided that we build up a buffer stock, preferably by imports, to take care of this problem in future," said the Finance Minister.

"As far as the present stocks are concerned, we request the states which are in need to start lifting the quantities which are available. Farther quantities over the next few days will also be imported in the country so that the supply side problem can be taken care of, which will impact the prices," said Jaitley.

"We have also decided to invoke our price stabilisation fund, and therefore, the handling charges at the port, the transportation charges, the milling and the processing charges will be borne out of the price stabilisation fund. We hope that over the next few days, there will be a considerable amount of stock which will be coming to the market, and in view of the invocation of the price stabilisation funds, it will also have some impact on cooling down the prices as far as pulses are concerned," said the minister.

"We perused the wholesale price index data also which has come, otherwise the inflation situation in the country is concerned, and it is under control. The onion prices have already cooled down now," he added.