After Cooperatives began selling the fertilizers meant to farmers illegally to local businessmen, only 10 farmers in the district were lucky enough to get the subsidized fertilizer so far. However, rest of the farmers are facing acute scarcity of the chemical fertilizer essential for high-yield harvest.
Although Agriculture Input Corporation (AIC) has been distributing fertilizer to the farmers through local cooperatives, farmers are not getting enough fertilizer. According to Chief of AIC in Sarlahi Bishnu Kanta Jha, the corporation has distributed 6 thousand sacks of Urea and 8 thousand sacs of DAP fertilizers.[break]
AIC charges Rs 2,051 per sack of the fertilizer but the cooperatives are selling it to the businessmen by taking as much as Rs 800 more per sack, says Mahadev Mahato of Yadukuha. According to a chairperson of a cooperative in eastern part of the district, around 90 percent cooperatives are illegally selling the fertilizer meant for farmer to businessmen.
Jha expressed sadness over the farmer not getting the fertilizer meant for them. "We are working as per the law. However farmers complain that the fertilizer dispatched for them are being sold in the black market," Jha said further.
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