Chennai: A public interest litigation has been filed in the Madras high court, challenging the action of the state government, in hiking the Aavin milk price by Rs 6 per litre.
The PIL filed by V.Munikrishnan of Thiruvannamalai district is likely to come up for hearing soon.
In his petition, Munikrishnan, an agriculturist, submitted that he came to know from the print and visual media that the Tamil Nadu Co-operative Milk Producers’ Federation Limited has hiked the Aavin milk price by Rs 6 per litre and also increased the procurement price of cow milk by Rs 4 per litre and buffalo milk by
Rs 6 per litre. The government cited various reasons like increase of cattle feed and various inputs etc for hiking the prices. Further, based on the request of the dairy farmers, the government increased the milk price, he added.
He said most of the people were using Aavin milk and other product in all over Tamil Nadu. Comparing with other company milk products, the Aavin milk was affordable for the poor people’s economical status.
Therefore, only, the poor people were using the Aavin milk without choosing any other options. The state government has been spending huge public money for achieving its political goal and shifting the burden on the public, he alleged.
He said in these circumstances, without considering the public welfare, by way of Press Release dated August 17, 2019, the Tamil Nadu Co-operative Milk Producers’ Federation hiked the Aavin milk in all over Tamil Nadu from August 19. The government has decided to increase the prices of procurement of cow milk from Rs 28 to Rs 32 and buffalo milk from Rs 35 to Rs 41 per litre. Because of the sudden milk prices hike, the people who were under the poverty line and the middle class were put into irreparable loss, he added and sought to quash the press release.
