A week after in-charge and Animal Husbandry Minister Prabhu Chavan’s strict direction, officials of Agriculture department actively conducted raid on a shed and seized unregistered fertilizers and chemicals in Madiwaleshwar Nagar in Shahapur city on Friday.
Based on a tip-off, Agriculture officers with the help of police conducted a raid on the shed where they found unregistered fertilizers and pesticides stored in boxes which valued to ₹2.15 lakh.
After preliminary inquiry, it came to light that Balappa Chatrappa, 45, who is native of Lingsagur taluk in Raichur district had stored the chemicals and fertilizers unauthorizedly. He had brought these materials from an Agro Agency at Talikoti village in Vijayapur district to sell them to farmers, sources said.
“There were many complaints by the farmers’ association on illegal sale of fake seeds, chemicals and fertilizers in the city and surrounding areas. However, the Agriculture department had not been taken seriously. Only they took it seriously when the issue came up during the KDP meeting and Mr. Chavan strictly directed the officers about stern action on illegal and fake sale of fertilizers, chemicals and seeds,” a farmer leader said and urged to continue raids to curb illegal selling of seeds, fertilizers and chemicals.
This was the second incident where officials conducted raid. In the previous incident, they raided at Hoskeri village last month.
A case was registered in Shahapur police station.
Roopa Devi, Agriculture Officer, Bapugowda Patil, Parashuram, Shyamsundar Naik, PSI, Narayan and Bhaganna, Police Constable were present.
