The Tribune Impact: Conduct checks on DAP dealers, Addl Chief Secy tells DCs

Punjab Additional Chief Secretary, Agriculture, Anurag Verma has asked all Deputy Commissioners to form teams of executive magistrate and officers of Agriculture Department to conduct surprise checks on fertiliser dealers across the state, so as to stop the practice of selling diammonium phosphate ( DAP) at higher rates.

The letter has been sent to all DCs, days after The Tribune highlighted the plight of farmers, who are running helter skelter in search of the “elusive” DAP. The fertiliser has to be applied to fields for a good wheat crop, but farmers are being forced to buy the fertiliser at rates that are 10- 48 percent higher than their market rate.

The newspaper had highlighted how farmers across the state had been complaining that dealers were forcing them to buy the fertiliser as a bundled package with “irrelevant chemicals”. As a result, they are forced to pay anything between Rs 1,500- Rs 2,100 per bag of DAP, though it costs Rs 1,350 a bag. In a letter to all DCs, Verma has asked them to get surprise checks conducted and strict legal action be initiated against them. He has also said he will hold a video conference with all DCs on the issue on November 2.