Hry rice millers hold protest against physical verification

KARNAL: Agitated over the Haryana government’s decision to conduct another physical verification of rice mills in the state, members of the Rice Millers Association (RMA) held protests at the mini secretariat here on Tuesday .

The members claimed they have cancelled the Custom Milled Rice (CMR) agreement with the government and will conduct the milling of rice they had procured for the government agencies if the decision of physical verification is not withdrawn. They also handed over a memorandum for cancellation of CMR agreement to sub-divisional magistrate Narender Malik.

The rice millers said they will not deliver the CMR rice to the government because as per the agreement they have to return 30% of the total procured rice to the government by December end. They accused the government of insulting the rice millers by ordering repeated physical verification of the rice mills in the state.

They said they will shut their rice mills on December 18 and will not allow the government to conduct the physical verification scheduled from December 19 onwards.

President of the Karnal rice millers association Vinod Goel said due to repeated physical verifications, the rice millers could not achieve the target. The government had already conducted a physical verification of all rice mills in the state last month following allegations of bogus paddy purchases in mandis by unauthorised rice millers.