New Delhi, July 28 (IANS). The government on Tuesday said 4,84,663 raids were conducted across the country in 2025 against black marketing, hoarding, diversion and sale of poor quality fertilizer, resulting in 17,392 show cause notices being issued.
Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilizers Anupriya Patel told the Rajya Sabha that due to these raids, 6,941 licenses were suspended or canceled and 847 FIRs were registered. He also explained about the government’s elaborate system to ensure uninterrupted supply of fertilizers and maintain affordable prices.
Government data revealed that the availability of urea, DAP, MOP and NPKS during FY 2025-26 was much more than the requirement.
For that period, the availability of urea was 450.79 lakh metric tonnes against the requirement of 381 lakh metric tonnes. DAP’s requirement of 110 lakh MT was easily met with the availability of 121.72 lakh MT.
The Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare and the Department of Fertilizers in collaboration with State Governments assess month-wise and state-wise fertilizer requirements and allocate supplies through monthly plans.
The movement of all major subsidized fertilizers is tracked through the Integrated Fertilizer Management System (IFMS).
The government also decides on fertilizer imports well in advance to bridge the gap between domestic production and demand and coordinates with manufacturers and importers for timely supplies.
The minister said it works closely with the Railway Ministry for priority movement of fertilizer rakes (goods train coaches), and state governments oversee distribution at the district-level.
Fertilizers remain affordable for farmers through the Urea Subsidy Scheme and Nutrient-Based Subsidy (NBS) Scheme. Under the urea subsidy scheme, the maximum retail price (MRP) of a 45 kg bag of urea remains Rs 242 per bag, and the difference between the delivery cost and the market price is compensated as subsidy to manufacturers or importers.
To keep DAP affordable at Rs 1,350 per 50 kg bag during Kharif 2026, additional support of Rs 3,500 per metric tonne has been provided on imported and domestic DAP and NBS subsidy on imported TSP.
The minister said that the government has also taken several steps to ensure the availability of safe and quality pesticides.
The Registration Committee constituted under the Pesticides Act, 1968 registers the pesticides only after evaluating their effectiveness and safety. Pesticide inspectors appointed by the central and state governments regularly collect samples from manufacturing units and retail outlets to check quality.
–IANS
SCH/DKP
