Srinagar
Police has filed a case and initiated investigation following seizure of over one thousand quintals of sub-standard rice from Food Corporation of India (FCI) depot in Bumhama area of north Kashmir’s Kupwara district.
Official sources told news agency GNS that the Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution Department (CA&PD) had last month received several complaints about the supply of sub-standard rice to the people from the Food Corporation of India (FCI) godown in Bumhama.
Acting upon the complaint, a team of CA&PD headed by Additional Director Food (AD) Mudasir Ahmad Wani carried out an inspection and seized over one thousand quintals of sub-standard rice from the godown.
When contacted, Additional Director CA&PD, Kupwara Mudasir Ahmad Wani confirmed to GNS that over one thousand quintals of rice were found to be of “poor quality”.
“The rice through FCI comes for schools as well as for our department (CAPD) and we later distribute it among people and we ensure that poor quality rice is not distributed,” he said, adding, “It is better than an FIR is registered as the rice which comes from FCI is received only once the FCI committee, constituted for the purpose, approves the same.”
He said that the committee takes the samples and “we have no knowledge about these samples.”
“FCI is a different department and we only procure rice from them on monthly basis and keeping in view the fact that rice is to be distributed among the poor, I thought appropriate to have an FIR filed. We have to ensure that there is no compromise with the quality of the rice to be distributed among the poor.”
He said that a factual statement has been forwarded to the police based on which the FIR was registered.
When contacted, a police officer said that an FIR (113/2019 under section 270, 273 RPC) has been registered following the complaint received from the CAPD officials.
Meanwhile, people demanded that investigation should not be restricted to a thousand odd quintals of rice but to overall supplies made to schools and far-flung areas.
An officer of the CAPD department told news agency GNS that governor administration should entrust the probe to Crime Branch or any other agency as some FCI people mingle poor quality rice with every truck.
