House panel to seek President's appointment

BHUBANESWAR: An assembly committee headed by speaker P K Amat on Friday decided to meet President Ram Nath Kovind to apprise him of the state's demand to fix the minimum support price (MSP) of paddy at Rs 2930 per quintal.
The assembly panel move comes despite the Centre's recent decision to hike paddy MSP by Rs 200 per quintal. The BJP members, however, skipped the meeting while it was attended by leader of opposition Narasingha Mishra, several cabinet ministers and legislators from the BJD, the Congress and the CPI(M).

"A decision was taken at the meeting that the speaker will soon write to the President of India seeking his appointment. Since the assembly had earlier passed a resolution that the support price of paddy should be fixed at Rs 2930 per quintal (for common paddy), we will submit a memorandum in this regard," senior BJD leader Sanjay Das Burma said.

Das Burma, a former food supplies minister, also said Rs 200 hike per quintal in the MSP of paddy is not acceptable as the cost of production in Odisha is Rs 2344 per quintal.

Though a resolution was passed in the assembly to take up the issue with the President in December last year, the committee did not meet before the Centre announced its decision to hike the MSP.

Leader of opposition Narasingha Mishra accepted that the committee should have met frequently since the farmers have been betrayed by the NDA government for the past four years.

"Because of the Centre's assurance to increase the MSP about one and a half time of the cost of production, we were waiting for the decision. We are not satisfied with the Rs 200 hike. So we have decided to apprise the President of India about it," Mishra said.

Farmers' organisations said the Centre may not consider the demand to revise it again since the Centre has already hiked the MSP for the 2018-19 kharif year.

Congress chief whip Tara Prasad Bahinipati came down heavily on the BJP for skipping the house committee meeting.

On the committee's decision to seek appointment with the President, Bahinipati said it had on several occasions sought appointment from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss the MSP issue.

Defending the Centre, state BJP vice-president Sameer Mohanty said the assembly panel's move is aimed at politicising the issue.