Govt. releasing 1 lakh tonne of onion buffer stock: Tomar

TIL Desk/Business/New Delhi/ Amid the soaring prices of onion, Union Agriculture Minister has said one lakh tonne of buffer stock of the key kitchen staple is being released by the government to provide relief to people. He was talking to reporters on Wednesday after taking part in a rally in Dharampuri town of Indore district ahead of the November 3 bypolls to 28 Assembly seats in Madhya Pradesh.

“The government has already taken cognisance of the issue of rising prices of onion and its one lakh tonne of buffer stock is being released through NAFED,” Tomar said. “We had imposed a ban on the export of onion from the country well in time and opened routes for its import,” the minister said.

Nationalist Congress Party chief and former Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday blamed the central government’s policies for the rising prices of onion, and said he would speak to the Centre about the stock limit imposed on the commodity traders.

Referring to Congress’s protests on the new farm laws, Tomar accused the opposition party of having double standards. In its 2019 Lok Sabha poll manifesto, the Congress promised to make trade free of regulations, he said.