THE GUJARAT Association of fair price shop owners on Saturday declared an “indefinite” strike to protest against “unmet” demands, such as increased commissions and minimum guaranteed commissions, prompting nearly 17,000 fair price shops to remain shut on November 1.
President of the All Gujarat Association of Fair Price Shops, Prahlad Modi – who is also Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s brother – said that earlier in the day, discussions held with the Principal Secretary of Food and Civil Supplies Department failed as the state government “refused to formalise the verbal assurances given to the association.”
Even as the Gujarat government on Saturday issued a statement saying that it was introducing biometric verification of the members of the vigilance committee while accepting grain stocks delivered to fair price shops through the doorstep delivery system to ensure transparency and accuracy in stock delivery, the Association said it would go ahead with the strike.
In its statement, the government pointed out that Gujarat was the only state to provide Rs 20,000 as minimum guaranteed commission to fair price shop owners as well as the only state to distribute edible oil and additional sugar during festivals at concessional prices.
The state is “focussed on ensuring financial stability” for the fair price shop dealers, the statement said.
The government also appealed to the fair price shop owners to withdraw their strike and continue to provide service ration card holders. However, despite a meeting convened by the Principal Secretary of Civil Supplies Department, the stalemate continued on Saturday as the Association stood firm on having their 20-point demands met. Prahlad Modi told The Indian Express, “We have decided to continue the strike until the government gives us a written undertaking on the matter. We do not believe their verbal assurances as every time we raise issues, they make such promises and take us for a ride. We have a 20-point list of problem areas that need to be looked into.”
He added that apart from increased commissions, the fair price shop owners are also demanding an amendment in the clause that only those fair price shop owners, who have distributed grains to 94 per cent beneficiaries by biometric means are eligible for the minimum commission of Rs 20,000 as well as compulsory maintenance of manual records. The demands also include immediate clearances of Rs 25 lakh compensation to the fair price shop owners who died during the Covid pandemic as well as single finger print bill generation of ration card holders.
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Prahlad Modi said, “We have also objected to the inflexible deadlines for generation of challans and depositing funds for stock delivery. The problem is that they wanted us to fill the challan on 22nd of the previous month with the deadline to generate challan decided as 28th of the previous month. If the fair price owner does not have money in that period, how can he make the payments? There should be flexibility and right now the system is like a noose… We have also demanded that the minimum commission should be raised from Rs 20,000 to Rs 30,000. There is inflation. If the Centre has decided minimum wages at Rs 14,000 per month, how will fair price shop owners be able to pay their labour and staff without a minimum guaranteed commission? There has been no agreement on this issue. But even as they were agreeing on some demands, they refused to give it in writing… In the past, we have seen they have added conditions and clauses that were never discussed in meetings and lead to the shop owners not getting any commission.”
He added that the associations of the state were opposed to the prevalent condition that 94 per cent of the distribution done should be of the biometric registered beneficiaries. “But if not all the beneficiaries are taking the grains, how can we be held accountable for that… So, we will continue our strike until a resolution is reached.”
