He also asked them to deploy additional lorries and hamalis to improve movement from procurement centres to mills
NALGONDA: Civil supplies commissioner Stephen Ravindra on Tuesday directed officials to expedite paddy procurement and transportation to avoid delays in lifting stocks from farmers.
During a surprise inspection of the Primary Agricultural Cooperative Society (PACS) procurement centre at Peddakaparthy in Chityal mandal, he instructed officials to speed up unloading at rice mills, vehicle movement and transportation of paddy. He also asked them to deploy additional lorries and hamalis to improve movement from procurement centres to mills.
The commissioner reviewed the quantity of paddy received, availability of hamalis, vehicles tagged to mills, tarpaulins and other logistics. He directed officials to ensure timely entry of procurement data in the system and inquired about the use of dryers and cleaning processes at centres. He also asked them to arrange additional tarpaulins wherever required.
Officials informed him that 25,000 quintals of paddy had arrived at the Peddakaparthy centre, of which 7,000 quintals had been procured. About 15,000 metric tonnes of paddy was available at the centre. As it is a major centre, 10 to 20 additional lorries had been arranged.
Ravindra directed officials to complete procurement in the district within 15 days and stressed that payments to farmers should not be delayed. He also instructed that tents, drinking water and ORS packets be provided at procurement centres.
Later, he inspected Siddhartha Rice Industries at Vattimarthy and directed the management to speed up unloading and increase vehicle rotation. He reviewed system-based uploading of procurement data and asked officials to clear pending entries.
He directed that paddy be shifted to intermediate godowns if mills face space constraints and instructed Transport Department Deputy Commissioner Vani to arrange more vehicles.
District collector B. Chandrasekhar said advance information had been given to millers to ensure availability of hamalis, with about 30 deployed at each procurement centre and 30 to 35 workers engaged at mills.
Civil supplies director Rohit Singh, Nalgonda SP Sharath Chandra Poawar, additional collector (revenue) J. Srinivas and other officials were present.
