Fair Price Shop Dealers Demand Monthly Income, Threaten Mass Agitation

Fair Price Shop dealers, who played a vital role in delivering foodgrains to the needy during the Covid-19 pandemic, have threatened a mass agitation if their demands are not met. The All India Fair Price Shop Dealers Federation representatives met Union Minister of Food and Public Distribution Piyush Goyal where they pressed for their demands including the reinstation of PM Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana as well as a minimum monthly honorarium to ensure stable livelihood. Speaking to Zee News Digital, Biswambhar Basu, national general secretary of the AIFPSDF said that Goyal assured to resolve the issues as soon as possible. 

"Our dealers will meet Member of Parliament of their areas and urge them to raise our demands in Parliament. On July 25, we will hold a convention in Talkatora Stadium in Delhi where leaders of political parties will also be invited. We will ask them for cooperation and if any party refuses to help us, we will campaign against the party in the next election from our shops. We will support a party which makes our demand part of their 2024 election manifesto," said Basu.

Basu further said that around 5 lakh fair price shop dealers will gather in Delhi's Ramlila Maidan in January to take out a 'historic rally' to 'gherao Parliament' if their demands remain unfulfilled. 

"We are suffering losses. We have demanded the government to provide us a minimum monthly honorarium of Rs 50,000. We have also urged the government to increase our commission and honorarium to make FPS viable," said Basu.

At present, the FPS dealers get Rs 90 per quintal of grains. They also managed to make some meagre money by selling the empty jute sacks, informed Basu. The association said in a statement that Goyal directed the officials to do away with the maintenance of any register for FPS as all the work has gone paperless. The association has also demanded the government allow them to sell non-PDS items like edible oil, pulses, sugar, atta etc from their counters. It said that Goyal assured Mudra loans for the FPS dealers.

The association said that the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (NAFED) agreed to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to sell pulses, edible oil and other essential items of daily use from the Fair Price Shops. The association also said that if their demands are not met, they will move to the Supreme Court as well.