BADIN, March 19: The nexus between sugar mills owners and middlemen is taking advantage of farmers’ growing impatience to get their lands ready for other crops by suddenly scaling down the sugarcane’s purchase price by Rs10 per 40 kilogram to Rs74.50-Rs75.
The middlemen often use blackmailing and threats to force growers either to sell their produce for less or let it wither away as the mills will close crushing by the end of March, a survey conducted by this scribe on Monday revealed.
At present almost all the mills in the district face no-cane-situation despite the fact that 20 to 30 per cent crop mostly belonging to small growers still awaits to be harvested.
The tug of war between growers and mill owners over cane price have been going on for months bringing the rural economy to a grinding halt and inflicting huge financial losses on the growers.
Though the government had fixed cane price at Rs67 per 40 kg but the mills offered as much as Rs100 per 40 kg to big landlords and left the small growers waiting in the cold.
Allahdito Bhurgri and Mohammad Ali Khan, sugarcane growers, complained to Dawn that nearly 20 to 25 per cent of cane was still standing in the fields as it could not be lifted due to shortage of labourers who were busy in wheat harvesting.
They said that some growers were expecting further raise in rates to Rs85 to Rs100 per 40 kg as it had happened last year but their hopes had shattered now.
The mills owners on the other hand decided in a recent meeting not to purchase the crop for more than Rs75 per 40 kg. Ameen Warkh, Cane Manager at Pangrio Sugar Mills, confirmed that the millers had decided to roll back the cane’s purchasing price and now his mill was buying cane at Rs74.50 per 40 kg.
He said that the mill had completed almost 50 per cent purchase target while more than 700,000 maunds sugarcane was still standing in the fields. It was impossible for the mills to continue paying high rates after the intervention of brokers, he said.
He denied the mill had received any instruction from the PSMA about decreasing cane price and said that the mills management took the decision on its own.
Mr Ameen said while speaking on phone from Digri, where he said, he had gone to convince sugar mills not to pay high price for the crop and take other mills into confidence.
Mr Riaz of Bawani Sugar Mills Talhar said that the mills brought down the price from Rs85 per 40 kg to Rs75 per 40 kg as per decision of mills owners. The growers were still getting more than the rate fixed by the government, he said and added that the crushing season would end by the end of March or the first week of April.
Representatives of Sugarcane Growers Association, claimed that the mill owners were taking revenge from the small growers for the support price they had been compelled to pay to them. They termed the drop in prices a bitter prank with the growers who were already thinking to stop the cane cultivation for good.
They warned that if the mill owners refused to pay them fair price for their crop they would have no choice but to switch over to other lucrative crops.
Laar Abadgars Association President Abdul Jabbar Gopang, Zafar Shah, Mohammad Nawaz Memon and several representatives of growers associations rebuffed the mills’ claim that they had to reduce prices to escape losses.
They termed it part of a conspiracy against growers and demanded that the government should keep regular and effective check on the mills, which were causing losses to the growers and sought action against the brokers.
They demanded that it should be made binding on the mill owners not to decrease the rates of sugarcane and keep away from middle men.