Now, Nagaland rejects rice consignment from state

As many as 18 wagons of rice, that left Punjab’s godowns earlier this month for Dimapur in Nagaland, have been found to have “first level” of pest infestation, besides having less than the specified fortified rice kernels.

A communique in this regard has been received by the state government as well as officials of the regional office of the Food Corporation of India (FCI). This is the third rice consignment from Punjab that has been rejected, after being labelled as “beyond rejection limit”. Earlier, the rice consignments sent to Arunachal Pradesh and Karnataka were rejected for having broken grains beyond the specifications, and the rice millers in the state had been asked to replace the rice at their own cost.

The consignment rejected by Nagaland was reportedly dispatched from Sunam on November 4, and offloaded at Dimapur on November 11 and 12. Once these 23,097 bags, having 11,241.59 quintals of rice, were checked for quality, it was found that these contained less than the specified amount of fortified rice kernels, ranging from 0.52 to 0.78 per cent. The rice used for public distribution should contain 0.9 to 1 per cent of fortified rice kernels. This rice was harvested and milled in the 2022-23 crop year.

In some of the rakes, the rice was found to be having first level of pest infestation, it is learnt. The third rejection has set the alarm bells ringing in the state, as fears of it being used to discourage paddy cultivation in the state next year are being raised by both farmers and rice millers. They say that rice from the state is dispatched only after its quality has been checked, and the damage to quality could have been done either during transportation and handling, or while it was stored in other states.

Now, FCI teams from the region and those posted in Nagaland will jointly conduct fresh quality tests.

“From the initial reports, we have gathered that the rice sent to Nagaland is of ‘issuable condition’, and is fit for human consumption. It is likely that the infestation or other damage to grains could have happened during the transportation, but all this is a matter of investigation,” B Srinivasan, regional general manager of Punjab region of the FCI, told The Tribune.