After a long wait, Uttarakhand today announced its state advised price (SAP) for sugarcane at Rs 192-197, which is the highest in the country.
For the normal and early varieties, the price has been fixed at Rs 192 and 197, respectively, state Sugarcane Minister Madan Kaushik said here. The availability of the rejected variety is negligible in the state.
Significantly, Kaushik said all the six sugar mills in the government sector would also pay the bonus on the lines of private sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand.
With the announcement, all the 10 sugar mills in the state have started their crushing season. While nine sugar mills, four of them in private sector, had already been crushing cane since last week, the government-controlled Doiwala sugar mill started crushing today.
The announcement of the SAP, which was delayed by more than a fortnight, came after the four private sugar mills entered into an agreement with farmers to procure sugarcane at Rs 215-225 last week.
Kaushik said the government had been waiting for the Centre to amend the controversial ordinance which had put the onus on the states to pay the difference of SAP and fair and remunerative price (FRP) of Rs 129.84.
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“Despite no action by the Centre to amend the ordinance, we are going ahead to announce our SAP,” said Kaushik.
Experts said the announcement of SAP at Rs 192-197 was on expected lines since private sugar mills were already paying much higher price to farmers.
Now, it would be interesting to watch how much bonus would be declared by government sugar mills in the state. “We will assure you that the bonus will come,” said Kaushik.
Last fortnight, farmers in Haridwar had stopped trains and blocked traffic at various areas to lodge their strong protest against non-declaration of SAP while demanding better price for their produce.
Ever since the announcement of FRP, the Uttarakhand government has been hesitant on the SAP, which in turn had delayed the crushing season by more than 15 days.