IT News
Kakching, July 12:
Amid hue and cry over government failure to distribute subsidized Urea fertilizers to the farmers of the state, a huge quantity of Urea fertilizer (400 bags) was found hidden in a private store room located at Wabagai Bazar in Kakching district. Members of Kakching District United Club Organisation distributed the hidden urea fertilizers to needy farmers.
The store room, which also runs as a shop where the 400 bags of Urea fertilizer, were piled and hidden comes under Wabagai Assembly constituency, where BJP MLA Usham Deben has been recently elected as the representative in the 12th Manipur Legislative Assembly Election and it belonged to one Naorem Santa.
Local source said that the fertilizer bags recovered were hidden by the local MLA Usham Deben Singh, however, at the filing of this news report, there is no official confirmation about the owner of the urea fertilizer hidden in the shop’s store room.
Earlier, Chief Minister N. Biren Singh and the agriculture minister had assured stringent action against any culprits irrespective of their position if found selling or hijacking Urea fertilizers, which are meant for distribution to the farmers.
Interestingly, it was neither the state police nor the officials of the Department of Agriculture that traced and found the hidden fertilizers, but it was the local farmers and the members of LOUSAL(Loumee Sinmi Apunba Lup) and the (KADUCO) Kakching District United Club Organisation, that conducted the drive and recovered the huge quantity of Urea fertilizers hidden in a store room at Wabagai.
Laishram Shyam, Vice president of LOUSAL, who also joined the drive on Monday, expressed confusion on the reason for hiding the Urea fertilizers in a store room of a shop, instead of distributing them to farmers who are urgently in need.
“ After the seizure of the urea fertilizer bags, we the member of the KADUCO have decided to distribute those to the farmers, but, while making preparation the owner of the shop locked the shop making the club members helpless”, a member told reporters. The matter was intimated to the LOUSAL.
Laishram Shyam further told that the owner of the shop had told the Urea fertilizers belong to MLA Usham Deben, however, it is still to confirm whether the fertilizers are hidden by the MLA or belong to some others planning to earn easy quick money by selling in the black market.
“No matter, the fertilizers will be distributed to needy farmers”, said Vice President of LOUSAL.
However late in the evening, irate members of the KADUCO distributed the hidden fertilizers to the farmers.
He further said that the locals of the area had informed the LOUSAL and KADUCO that the fertilizer bags were unloaded at the shop on 8 (eight) of last month. The government authority should let the public know – who is the owner of those fertilizers and how it was found hidden in a store room.
As per information from the Agriculture Department, 2000 bags of Urea had been released through proper channels for farmers of the Wabagai Assembly Constituency. For the month of June and July, the department had released 1500 bags of Urea and another 500 bags of urea through a proper official channel, an official source told reporters.
