Hyderabad: As many as 115 rice millers owe 57,781 metric tonnes of rice worth Rs 134 crore to the government for the public distribution system. These arrears have accumulated since 2010-11. Civil supplies commissioner C.V. Anand on Wednesday met with defaulters and offered to lift criminal cases against them and release seized mills if they returned all the customised milling rice to the state in one go by November 30.
The millers sought concessions like return of stocks in two instalments and waiver of interest but Mr Anand turned them down, stating that the government had suffered losses years due to misappropriation of rice stocks by millers. “All criminal and other cases booked under Section-6A of the Revenue Recovery Act will be lifted if they return 100 per cent of CMR stocks,” Mr Anand said.
He said if millers returned 75 per cent of the stocks by November 30, they would be given time till January 30, 2017, to return the rest of the rice. They would also be given fresh stocks of paddy. Millers owe Rs 6.76 crore worth rice stocks for 2010-11, Rs 7.94 crore for 2011-12, Rs 22.08 crore for 2012-13, Rs 31.75 crore for 2013-14 and Rs 65.46 crore for 2014-15.
The arrears increased after Telangana state was formed in 2014. Millers in Nalgonda district had dues of Rs 45.74 crore, Medak Rs 5.15 crore, Mahbubnagar Rs 8.75 crore, Nizamabad Rs 12.28 crore, Adilabad Rs 22.54 crore, Warangal Rs 22.94 crore and Khammam Rs 3.38 crore.
