Chandigarh, January 2
As many as 166 rice mills, which were involved in supplying substandard rice to the Central pool with the connivance of certain officials of the Food Corporation of India (FCI), have been blacklisted by the FCI authorities.
Besides, the FCI has identified 30 centres notorious for supplying substandard rice with the alleged convince of officials. Special flying squads had been set up to keep watch on these centres in Punjab.
Acting tough, the FCI authorities have also issued chargesheets for a major penalty, including dismissal from service, to its 164 officers, including five district managers and as many district managers (quality control), for conniving with rice millers to accept substandard rice for the Central pool.
Rice with 5 per cent damage is declared unfit for human consumption. However, in certain cases of rice, supplied to the Central pool, the damage was found to be up to 22 per cent.
Sources said the FCI’s top brass in Delhi had informed the Punjab Government that the scandal involved Rs 700 crore. The CBI, which is looking into the scandal, has already taken 451 samples of rice from various places for examination.
The owners of the blacklisted rice mills had been told that they should replace the substandard stocks. “If they do so, we can think about removing them from the blacklist”, said a senior officer of the FCI.
Immediately after the scandal came to light, the FCI had removed the senior regional manager (SRM) belonging to the Punjab cadre of the IAS. It had handed over the charge of its regional office, that deals with Punjab, to Mr T.C. Gupta, an IAS officer of the Haryana cadre, who is also posted as SRM of the regional office that deals with Haryana.
Sources in the Punjab Government said that the top brass of the FCI in Delhi was annoyed at the manner in which certain Punjab IAS officers had handled affairs at the regional office that dealt with the state. An IAS officer of the Punjab cadre is posted at the regional office as SRM to deal with foodgrains, especially wheat and rice, procured for the Central pool.
The sources said that the top brass of the FCI was in a mood to recommend strong action against such IAS officers. The mess created by certain IAS officers of the Punjab cadre is now being set right.
One can gauge the chaos prevailing at the regional office from the fact that 1,200 complaints (the oldest one pertaining to 1984-85) regarding the quality of rice and wheat had been pending for settlement. Besides, about 5,000 cases of storage losses (the oldest one pertaining to 1981-82) were pending for regularisation and 3,000 cases of abnormal shortages at the destination pending
for investigation.Nearly 2,500 cases( certain cases relating to as 1986) were pending against employees, who were to be issued chargesheets for minor or major irregularities. However, this mess was being cleared in a systematic manner by the authorities by feeding the data into computers and dealing with the pending issues step by step.
Mr T.C. Gupta said he had nothing to say about what happened before he took charge. “I will not say anything in this regard”, he added. “But I can tells you that there is not a single complaint with regard to the quality of rice from the day I took over. I have done my bit to cleanse the system by putting everything in order”, he added.
“Already, about 15 lakh tonnes of rice has been despatched to various deficit states out of the 25 lakh tonnes has been accepted in the Central pool so far. About 87 lakh tonnes of rice was expected from Punjab this year for the Central pool”, he added. “As we have set a system in place this year to check all sorts of malpractices and irregularities, we have secured the ISO 9001-2000 certification for the Punjab region, which is a major achievement”, he added.
However, a senior officer of the FCI in Delhi said that Punjab needed “major surgery”. There had been a strong nexus between certain rice millers, some officers of the FCI, politicians and certain IAS officers. Substandard rice had been supplied to the Central pool and incalculable harm caused to Punjab’s reputation in the rice-deficit states.
Certain states had even started telling the FCI that they should not be supplied with rice from Punjab.
