Former CM alleges Rs 400 crore scam in tur procurement

Mumbai: Former chief minister of Maharashtra Prithviraj Chavan on Monday raised serious questions about tur procurement in the state. “We suspect that there may be a Rs 400 crore plus scam in the procurement of tur. We fear that tur imported from Mozambique may have been mixed with the domestic produce. There should be a thorough investigation into these issues,” Mr Chavan alleged.

The tur procurement fiasco has been food for serious political debate for the past one-and-a-half month. Mr Chavan pointed out that the government made a mistake in terms of expectations of tur production in the state. “On March 17, the state government submitted a report to the central government about 11 lakh 71 thousand tonne tur production in the state. However in just 18 days, the government’s estimates rose to as much as 20 lakh 322 thousand tonne tur. Whether this is just a statistical mistake or goes beyond that should be the topic of investigation,” he said.

The former CM said that the Indian government had inked an agreement with the Mozambique government for import of tur. “Estimates of procured tur increased as the imported tur reached Indian ports. This needs to be investigated. We suspect that there may have been an attempt to mix imported tur with Indian tur. If such a thing has been done, it is a big conspiracy,” he alleged.  

Mr Chavan also demanded that import duty on tur be increased from 10 per cent to 25 per cent. “All bilateral ties for tur imports with different countries should be cancelled to give justice to Indian farmers,” he demanded.