AIADMK trying to protect BJP government at Centre, says Udhayanidhi

The Deputy Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu Udhayanidhi Stalin has accused the AIADMK of trying to protect the BJP government.

Reading out a statement regarding the movement of paddy from the direct purchase centres in Delta, after inspecting the paddy bags loading operation at the railway goods shed here on October 23, the Deputy Chief Minister said that around 4000 tonnes of paddy are being moved out from Thanjavur and around 2000 tonnes, each, from Kumbakonam and Pattukottai per day.

With this being the case, the Leader of Opposition Edappadi K.Palaniswamy has made false observations about the functioning of direct purchase centres. He had said the non-movement of paddy procured at open DPCs has led to a space crunch at the centres. But, in the last 50 days alone, around 1825 DPCs have been set up and around 10 lakh tonnes of paddy procured.

Out of this, 81 % of paddy bags has been moved to the godowns and the remaining bags would be moved to the godowns within a week to 10 days. In the Delta region, storage facilities to stack another 2 lakh tonnes of paddy have been created. Hence, the accusation of Mr. Edappadi was false. Further, during last kuruvai season only 200 DPCs were set up but this year 300 centres have been set up, according to Mr. Udhayanidhi.

In Thanjavur district, 3000 paddy bags being procured at the Thennamanadu and Okkamanadu Kizhaiyur DPCs per day and 2000 bags of paddy, each, were procured at Orathanadu Pudur and Thiruvaiyaur Vilankudi centres. But, Mr. Edappadi claimed that only around 800 bags of paddy being procured at the DPCs citing a loadman’s statement. It cannot be understood that only 800 bags of paddy only procured in a centre if 800 bags of paddy was procured in any one of the DPCs across the State.

Necessary infrastructure facilities were made available to procure more than 1000 bags of paddy, he said and added that hence farmers have not made any complaint that their produce had not been procured at the DPCs.

Regarding his accusation that not many vehicles were available for moving the procured paddy bags from the centres. However, from this centre, which was opened on September 18, a total of 16000 bags have been moved from this centre till yesterday, he added.

Countering the allegation of sprouting of paddy, he said that the woman who made this complaint who had cultivated paddy at Varavakottai was yet to harvest the same. Regarding the fortified rice distribution through the public distribution system, the Union government had only deputed a team “for guidance” during July this year he said and added that “guidance” was different from “consent”. The teams have come to Tamil Nadu to decide whether to increase the moisture content in paddy from 17 per cent.