Imphal, August 15: Following imposition of huge monetary demand by some armed UG outfits, aggrieved fertiliser dealers engaged in lifting the same from outside the State have decided to stop their service if such undue demands continue to be imposed on them.

Talking to mediapersons in this connection at the training hall of Agriculture Department here this afternoon, fertiliser dealers informed that on August 12, one Jupiter who identified himself as the Imphal East commander of the proscribed PREPAK called the dealers for talks and imposed upon them a huge monetary demand setting August 25 as the deadline.

As the fertiliser dealers are not in a position to meet the demand, they have been compelled to study the option of suspending services.

Speaking of the difficulties being faced by the fertiliser dealers in lifting the respective quantity of the fertilisers allotted to them by the Government, the dealers pointed out that over and above the various taxes, legal as well as illegal, imposed along the National Highway, how much expenditure a dealer has to spend on bringing a fertiliser loaded truck from Namrup of Assam to Imphal should be understood by all concerned and withdraw the demand in consideration of the services being rendered by the dealers to the farmers of the State.

They also appealed to the outfit to come out with an explanation on the demand to the knowledge of the public.

In connection with shortage of fertilisers and its price rise in the State, the dealers explained that after the arrangement of the Government to entrust transportation of the fertilisers to the dealers themselves in 1994, out of the total 61 dealers only around 45 of them are actually engaged in the transportation.

Moreover, as per the allocation given by the Government, it is difficult for the dealers to lift more than 20 loads in a year.

In one load, 17 to 18 matric tonne of fertilisers are being transported.

On the other hand, besides the problems of technical failures encountered in the factory, inability of the dealers to transport the fertilisers in time due to occurrence of landslides or being stranded for long period due bandh/blockade and imposition of illegal taxes, invariably resulted in increase in the cost of transportation thus having its impact on the price of the fertilisers, the dealers observed.

Inspite of that, they added, one bag of urea is being made available to the agents at the rate of Rs 330 to 340 per bag who in turned sold to the farmers at the rate of Rs 350 to Rs 360 per bag after including the transportation charges.

In view of this fact, the fertiliser dealers appealed to the public for co-operation and support in finding out and preventing anyone from selling fertilisers to the farmers at exorbitant rate or any other wrong doings.

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