Govt says no subsidy for private pulses importers

The government has refused to extend 15 per cent subsidy to private traders for importing pulses as given to state-owned agencies citing reasons it has no mechanism to check overbilling, an industry official said.

"We had a meeting with senior government officials last week on the subsidy issue. The government did not accept our demand to extend 15 per cent subsidy to private importers of pulses," the Pulses Importers Association of India President K C Bhartiya said.

The representatives of Mumbai-based association, who met food and consumer affairs secretaries here last week, demanded the subsidy be extended to them as well because private trade had been more successful in importing the commodities than state agencies.

Import by private traders stood at 16.95 lakh tonnes till 2006, while state-owned companies have contracted 1.03 lakh tonnes till March 8, 2007.

The private importers also told the secretaries if the government was serious in checking the rise in prices of pulses, it should allow them the subsidy as state agencies would not be able to contract at a price that could have the stabilising effect in the domestic markets.

"International prices shoots up whenever state agencies floats a global tender to import pulses," a pulses importer said.

However, the government showed its unwillingness to extend the subsidy to private traders, saying it could not check overbilling if private importers resorted to such a tactic, Bhartiya said, adding the logistics problems were also cited for the inability to accede to the subsidy demand.

The government on April 12 had decided to import 15 lakh tonnes of pulses over the next 6-8 months through STC, MMTC, PEC and NAFED, and said it would also give 15 per cent subsidy to the public sector agencies.

The imports will include 7.5 lakh tonnes of urad, masur moong, gram and toor, and 7.5 lakh tonnes of yellow peas (white matar) and other pulses.

Earlier, Bhartiya had hailed the government's decision to import 15 lakh tonnes of pulses saying there was a need for the commodity in the domestic market.

However, he felt there was a need for the government to fix accountability on state agencies if they fail to import pulses and also put a timeframe for undertaking imports by these trading firms.

As per the third advance estimates, pulses production is likely to increase by 5.3 per cent at 14.10 million tonnes in 2006-07 against 13.39 million tonnes previous year.

Despite the expected increase in output, the country is likely to face a shortfall of 3.61 million tonnes of pulses as the projected consumption stands at 17.71 million tonnes.

Expressing concern over the stagnating pulses production, Agriculture Secretary P K Mishra had said earlier this month that the output was in the range of 11-14 million tonnes annually during the last 15 years.

The government is targeting to raise pulses production by 1.2 million tonnes by bringing in two lakh hectare more area under pulses cultivation.