Procurement issues will be resolved: Ashu

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, April 22

Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Minister, Punjab, Bharat Bhushan Ashu visited mandis a day after being sworn in as the Cabinet minister on Sunday. He said the Punjab Government was fully committed to procuring every grain of farmers.

He said payments were being made to farmers within 48 hours of procurement, so as to make sure that they don’t have to face harassment. Similarly, the online mode was also being adopted to further facilitate the payments to the farming community, he said.

The minister said he was yet to formally assume charge, but on the directions of Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, he decided to visit the mandis to have a first-hand knowledge of procurement procedures.

He said it had been brought to his notice that there were issues with regard to the lifting in mandis, which was due to the inclement weather and partly owing to the special lifting of paddy. He said he had a word with higher officials and serious endeavours would be made to ensure redressal of lifting problem in 2-3 days.

He said the mandi-wise distribution of trucks would be streamlined. He assured that there was no problem of gunny-bags (bardanaa) in mandis and the procurement as well as the payment process was going on with ease.

Ashu said after being sworn in as the minister, he had his priorities clearly chalked out with the first one being to ensure smooth procurement process and afterwards ensuring transparency as well as tackling corruption. He said during the last 1 year, the departmental functioning had witnessed a lot of improvement.

Lok Sabha MP Ravneet Singh Bittu, while congratulating Ashu on being sworn in as the Cabinet minister, said the Punjab Government was duty-bound to the all-round development of the state on every parameter of progress. He assured that the farmers won’t be allowed to be harassed in mandis during the procurement process.

Meanwhile, Bharat Bhushan Ashu was accorded the Guard of Honour at the Circuit House during his first visit to Ludhiana after being sworn in as the Cabinet minister.

Meanwhile, his posters on direction boards, unipoles raise eyebrows

Ludhiana: After the announcement of his name for Cabinet berth, Cabinet Minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu’s illegal posters were all over the city. City-based activists raised their voice against such illegal political advertisements.  Earlier, Mayor Balkar Singh Sandhu’s unauthorised hoardings and banners were displayed at different places when he became the Mayor last month. A city resident, Gurpal Singh Grewal, who had earlier marked protest against broken expansion joints on bus stand flyover, said: “Commuters suffer as posters have been displayed on even direction boards. Instead of defacing the city, there are other ways to offer congratulations. I appeal to the Cabinet minister to ask his supporters to stop displaying illegal posters.” Council of RTI Activists president Rohit Sabharwal said: “It seems politicians think that unipoles and direction boards are their private properties. They should keep in mind that the direction boards are for the convenience of commuters. The unipoles have been installed to generate income, but not to display political advertisements in an illegal manner.” The state government had introduced a new advertisement policy and fixed the responsibility of the officials to take action against illegal advertisements. MC’s Additional Commissioner Sanyam Aggarwal said they would look into the matter. — TNS