Even as Minister for Food and Civil Supplies, Manoj Kanti Deb urged upon the people not to panic about scarcity of food or fuel, the administration clamped down on some unscrupulous businessmen who indulged in hoarding and black marketing of essential commodities, ignoring warning .
The minister sought to assure the people that there was no need for either essential commodities or fuel.
The state has enough of food items in stock”, he said.
After torrential rain lashes parts of the Northeast disrupting state’s road and rail connectivity triggering fear of a crisis of essential commodities, the state government on Tuesday imposed restrictions on sale of petroleum products. But soon after the announcement long queues were seen in front of all fuel outlets across the state, which had triggered panic among the consumers.
Clarifying the present situation, Food Minister Manoj Kanti Dev said, ‘there is nothing to worry about. Diesel-petrol is being brought from Guwahati and Silchar. He also said that rice, wheat, lentils, pulses and sugar are stored in large quantities in the state”.
He reiterated that there was no need to bring food items through Bangladesh and no plan had been taken in this regard yet.
“We will be able to keep the supply of petrol, diesel, cooking gas and food normal,” he said. He also urged not to give long lines in front of petrol pumps unnecessarily.
In the meantime SDM Sadar, Asim Saha and Additional SDM Benoy Bhusan Das jointly conducted raids in Maharaj Ganj and other Commercial markets to recover hoarded goods and commodities as well as to keep the artificial price rise in control.
Over the last few months, a drama stage has been set up in the state markets. First, some unscrupulous traders claimed that the abnormal rise in petrol and diesel prices has pushed up commodity prices. Then during the last one week, they had been increasing the prices of essential commodities arbitrarily, claiming that goods transportation got disrupted due to severe floods in Assam. This in turn created an artificial crisis . Ordinary citizens complained that the prices of rice, pulses and cooking oil were doubled at the whim of the traders. The same was with potatoes, onions and other vegetables.
SDM Asim Saha while conducting the raid found massive irregularities. Talking to the reporters he said that the market was being raided to see if the prices of daily necessities had changed in the last few days as a kind of confusion had risen among the common people. The retail price of potato and onion is Rs. 22-23 per kg. while they were being sold to buyers at Rs 130 and chillies at Rs 140 per kg respectively. In the last few days, there had been no change in the market for daily commodities, he said.
In the course of raid the two officers found rotten vegetables and irregularities in papers of some shops and closed them down. Others were given strict warning mentioning that action would be taken against those traders under the Essential Commodities and Disaster Management Act if traders took abnormal prices from buyers on the pretext of bad road conditions.
The administrative officials said such operations would be carried out on regular basis
