Govt closely monitoring prices of sugar, other food items: Ram Vilas Paswan

Cabinet Secretary P K Sinha held a meeting on Tuesday to review the prices and availability of essential commodities

The government is keeping a close watch on prices of sugar, pulses, and edible oils to check hoarding and ensure adequate availability in the market in the festival season, Food Minister Ram Vilas Paswan said on Wednesday.

"Prices of essential food items are under control now. However, we are closely monitoring the price movement of sugar, edible oils, and pulses to ensure there is enough supply in the festival season," Paswan told PTI.

He said that there is not much increase in the sugar rates this time and even pulses prices are showing a declining trend with the arrival of the new kharif crop. He added that edible oils prices are also stable in retail markets.

"There is sufficient availability of sugar in the country and the government will take more measures, if required, to check price rise," the minister said.

On Tuesday, Cabinet Secretary P K Sinha had held a meeting to review the prices and availability of essential commodities, mainly sugar and pulses, and directed all the ministries concerned to strengthen monitoring mechanism and ensure availability of these items at reasonable prices during festival season.

According to the government data, the average retail price of sugar was ruling at Rs 40/kg on Wednesday, as against Rs 30/kg in the year-ago period.

In case of pulses, there has been some fall in retail prices in last few weeks on improved supply from new crop and imports, but the rates are still higher than last year with gram been sold at Rs 110/kg, tur at Rs 120/kg, urad at Rs 135/kg, moong at Rs 82/kg and masoor dal at Rs 85/kg.

Among edible oils, the retail price of groundnut oil and mustard oil were ruling stable at Rs 135/kg and Rs 100/kg, respectively, while soya oil and sunflower oil showed a marginal decline to Rs 85/kg each, the data showed.