Urea distribution under police watch in Madhya Pradesh

Severe urea crisis in Madhya Pradesh has caused riot-like situations in several parts of the state. The government is forced to deploy police force at distribution centres run by cooperative societies to ensure that farmers don’t loot sacks of fertilisers.

Opposition BJP and ruling Congress are blaming each other for the crisis even as farmers are forced to wait for hours in long queues to get barely two sacks of urea.

Angry farmers forcibly took away 70 sacks of urea in Shamshabad town of Vidisha district on Sunday. Following the incident, police personnel have been deployed at the district warehouses where thousands of farmers waited for hours for their turn.

At several towns, police resorted to mild force to disperse crowds of impatient farmers at the urea distribution centres. There are reports that the local administration in many big and small towns got urea distributed from police stations as local traders refused sale fearing farmers’ anger.

Former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan led a farmers’ protest in Sagar district and courted arrest last week while demanding adequate supply of fertiliser. A case was registered against BJP MLA Pradeep Laria over a protest against shortage of urea in the state.

The Kamal Nath government has blamed the crisis on the Centre.

The government has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging the Centre to release 2.40 lakh metric tonnes of urea belonging to the state quota at the earliest.

It was mentioned in the letter that the state had received a reduced amount of urea for the month of November.

Agriculture minister Sachin Yadav said that 80% of the urea procured from the Centre would be sold from cooperative societies. Till now the ratio of the fertilizers sold from societies and in open markets was 50:50, the minister said.

Congress media cell coordinator Narendra Saluja slammed the BJP leaders including Shivraj Singh Chouhan saying that these leaders remain vocal on different issues but turn tight-lipped over the step-motherly treatment meted out to Madhya Pradesh by the Centre.