Against the grain

Madhya Pradesh’s farm sector grew a whopping 18 per cent last year. Claiming all the credit for it, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said on Saturday it all started when he was snubbed by New Delhi a few years ago for not producing enough cereals. He had gone to ask for additional wheat and rice for Madhya Pradesh but was told how could he make such a demand when the central agencies weren’t procuring any in his state. Last year’s harvest was so bountiful, said Chouhan at a function organised by Business Standard Hindi in Bhopal, that all warehouses were filled to capacity and he commandeered everything he could to cover the grain lying in the open fields. One senior officer, a south Indian, stopped drying his lungi outside, according to Chouhan, fearing the government might confiscate it to protect the grain.