‘Grant permission to manufacture ethanol from paddy’

Raipur, Nov 15: Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel attending the virtual meeting with the Finance Minister Dr Nirmala Sitharaman said that the state government achieved the 35% target of capital expenditure in the first and second quarter. He said that Chhattisgarh is known as ‘bowl of rice’ and here large quantity of paddy is cultivated. CM said in last two-three years, the state government has urged for sanction of constructing bio-ethanol plants using paddy and added that if the central government grants permission then the state government can used surplus paddy for production of bio-ethanol. CM said that this will benefit the state and its farmer and would help in saving the foreign currency spent on import of petroleum product by GoI.
CM informed the Union FM that the state government has made preparations for making bio-ethanol from paddy and has entered into MoU with 12 companies to install Ethanol plants in the state. He informed that the state has got permission to make Ethanol from sugarcane and ‘maize’, but he urged FM to grant permission to make Ethanol from paddy. CM informed that the GoI has given consent to purchase 61.65 lakh MT paddy from Chhattisgarh in 2021-22 and added that the decision not to take ‘Usna’ rice from state was taken by the central government. He said that this decision of central government is not in favour of state, millers and its labourers. Baghel said that there are 500 ‘Usna’ mills in the state having production capacity of 5 lakh MT per month and with this decision all ‘Usna’ rice mills will close down and would render the laboures and employees unemployed. CM Baghel drawing attention of FM towards deposit of Rs 4140 crore in the Coal penalty on part of Chhattisgarh in the central pool and urged the FM to return it to Chhattisgarh. CM informed that the Union Coal Minister has granted sanction in principle for refund of this coal penalty and at present the final action in this regard is to be taken by the Finance Ministry of GoI.
Urging to convert the revenue loss of 15th Finance Commission into grants, CM Bhupesh Baghel informed Union FM taht in 2021-22, a total of 17 states are being paid Rs 1.18 lakh crore as grants of last few years to meet up their revenue loses. He said that this grant should be given to aid the economy affected after Covid-19 pandemic from 2021-22 to 2024-25 taking the revenue loss as its basis. He said that the loss due to Covid-19 cannot be made out of this. The loss which occurred last year is being paid in the form of grants. Baghel said that it would have been better if the states affected from Covid-19 would have been given grants and this would have compensated for loss due to Covid-19. He said that the states which could not maintain proper finances have been granted grants and those maintaining proper financial system are being ignored and termed it as sheer injustice and urged FM to reconsider the same.
Meeting was attended by the Chief Secretary of State Amitabh Jain, Addl. CS Subrata Sahoo, Principle Secretary Industry Manoj Pingua, Secretary to CM Siddharth Komal Pardeshi, Fiance Secretary Alamelmangai D, Secretary Co-op Deptt Himshikhar Gupta, Secretary Food deptt- TK Verma, Secretary Revenue Deptt NN Ekka, Special Secy Ankit Anand, Director Industries Anil Tuteja, MD MARKFED Kiran Kaushal, Director Finance Sharda Verma and other senior officers.