CM Yogi inaugurates two sulphur-free sugar plants
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said that the state government had paid cane prices which were more than the annual budgets of several states.
Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday inaugurated plants for manufacturing sulphur-free sugar at Munderwa and Pipraich sugar mills located in Basti and Gorakhpur districts respectively.
The chief minister inaugurated the new sulphur-free plant of Munderwa Sugar Mill online from the Pipraich Sugar Mill complex as his helicopter could not land in Munderwa due to poor visibility and inclement weather conditions. Both the mills belong to UP State Sugar Mills Corporation.
The chief minister said that his government operated 119 sugar mills of the state in times of novel coronavirus pandemic during the last cane crushing season (2019-20).
The sugar mills have so far paid a record Rs 1.12 lakh crore to the cane farmers.
He said this had never happened before. The chief minister pointed out that many states did not even have an annual budget of this size.
Yogi Adityanath said sulphur-free sugar had a huge market in hospitals and other institutions which in turn would give a new identity to sugarcane farmers of eastern Uttar Pradesh.
He said the previous governments had plundered the sugar industry by selling 21 sugar mills to the private sector under a conspiracy.
He said the Bharatiya Janata Party government, after taking charge of the state in 2017, revived the defunct sugar mills, including the sugar mills of Pipraich and Munderwa.
The chief minister said that a private sector sugar mill was set up in Pipraich in 1932 and it was acquired in 1974 but the mill closed in 1999. Similarly, he said, the private sector sugar mill in Munderwa (Basti) was started in 1932, it was acquired by the government in 1984 but it too closed down in 1999.
Yogi Adityanath pointed out that when the state government decided to revive the closed sugar mills, the opposition parties spread rumours.
The old mills used to crush 12 lakh quintals of sugarcane in a year and after revival and modernisation their capacity has been increased to 45 lakh quintals per mill.
Yogi Adityanath charged that the opposition parties, which were accustomed to selling sugar mills at throwaway prices, could not digest how new sugar mills were being set up.
He said the refined sugar produced in Pipraich and Munderwa would take the sweetness of eastern Uttar Pradesh all over the world and it would also lead to the branding of Pipraich and Munderwa.
He said the branding of the sugar of sugarcane farmers of Pipraich and Munderwa would be done by the government, that too absolutely free.
The chief minister motivated youth to take to other sugarcane products. He said that instead of being limited to sugar production through mills, sugarcane juice packing and good quality jaggery production could also be adopted.
He said that there was a great demand for sugarcane juice in jaundice disease and if new technology was used for sugarcane juice packing, many youth could get employment.
Yogi said that his government would also revive other closed sugar mills in the state. He said directives had been issued in this regard and the work would be expedited as soon as the coronavirus outbreak was over.
Yogi praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s efficient leadership. He said that the country remained safe under the leadership of Modi during the pandemic period.
He said during the height of the pandemic, the government ensured that food was delivered to each and every person across the country.
Yogi Adityanath lashed out at the Samajwadi Party and the Congress. He said that the leaders of SP used to make snide remarks on PM Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana by dubbing it as an election stunt, saying it would stop after the polls.
Yogi said, “It is not the laptop of SP which will be withdrawn.”
The chief minister said that PM Kisan Samman Nidhi was launched by PM Narendra Modi from the fertiliser ground in Gorakhpur and this year, 2.20 crore farmers of UP had received an instalment of Rs 4,443 crore.
