Rice millers seek Vigilance probe against FCI official

Our Correspondent

Fatehgarh Sahib, April 11

The Punjab Rice Millers Association led by Tarsem Saini, national president, and Inderjeet Sandhu, district president, sat on a dharna at the FCI depot, Sirhind, today protesting against the area manager of the FCI of the Chandigarh zone.

They alleged that he had been demanding bribe and harassing rice millers in lieu of providing special rail wagons for the movement of rice to other states. They raised slogans against the area manager as well as the FCI management and demanded a Vigilance inquiry against him.

Addressing mediapersons, Saini claimed that the regional office, FCI, Punjab, on February 29 arranged a special train for the movement of rice to other states for loading 50 per cent rice from the Chanarthal centre and 50 per cent from the Sirhind centre, but the area manager got loaded the rice stocks of Chanarthal centre only, thereby leaving 39 millers of Sirhind as he wanted bribe.

He said had the rice been lifted, there would have been enough space to store it, but now godowns were full and there was no space. He said again on April 1 special train wagons were allotted for the movement of rice from the Sirhind centre, but he did not allow it. His action caused loss to the millers. He warned if the management did not take action against the “erring” official, the millers would protest.

However, Vinay Kumar, AGM, FCI, refuted the allegations of bribe. He claimed that it was all pressure tactics and nothing else as loading was a systematic process. “There is space problem, but I can’t do anything,” he added.