Lucknow, April 24: The year began on a good note for farmers in Uttar Pradesh’s potato belt: they had recorded a bumper crop. But now, they are stuck with rotting stocks as cold storages are turning them away for want of space.

The potato belt stretches from Kanpur to Agra, with the Agra region alone producing more than 30 per cent of the country’s total potato yield. According to agriculture experts, farmers have to spend Rs 5,500 on one bigha of potato farm, but at present rates, the return from one bigha would not fetch even Rs 4,000.

This year, UP registered a record potato production of 130 lakh metric tonne, against the usual 100-105 lakh MT. But the state has about 1,300 cold storages that have a combined capacity of storing only 90 lakh MT.

The concern of the BSP government for the potato growers is evident from the fact that while harvesting begins before the festival of Holi in March, the cabinet secretary convened a meeting on April 4 to “take stock of the situation” only after reports of violence by farmers at the gates of cold storages.

Violence was reported from Hathras and Etawah as owners of cold storages tried to flee angry farmers. In one such case, the owner fired in the air to scare away farmers.

After the meeting on April 4, the UP government issued orders for lifting one lakh MT at the rate of Rs 225 a quintal. Apart from NAFED, the government nominated three state agencies, Pradesh Co-operative Federation, UP Agro Industrial Corporation and UP State Horticulture Federation. The four agencies will purchase potato from farmers in 16 districts—NAFED will buy 50,000 MT, PCF 30,000 MT and UP Agro and HOFED 10,000 MT each.

However, farmers say the UP government’s effort proved to be “too little, too late”. The government is offering Rs 225 a quintal while the market price is Rs 275-280 a quintal, they said.

But Rajendra Singh, director of Horticulture department, refuted the charge that the government wasn’t reacting fast enough. “We have opened 29 centres for purchasing potato but so far the farmers have not responded,” he said. He claimed only 92 per cent of the storing capacity had been utilised. But sources say the potato growers of Uttar Pradesh are trapped in the politics of it all. The potato belt is a stronghold of the Samajwadi Party and is of little interest to the BSP government. The previous Samajwadi Party government had toyed with the idea of setting up vodka and potato chip units, but the scheme was shelved when the government changed in May 2007.

The SP government had drawn up plans to export potato and started the ‘UP Potato Export Facilitation Society” with 21 farmers from Farrukhabad, Kannauj, Agra, Etawah, Manipuri, Ferozabad, Meerut and Hapur as members. The office of the UP Potato Export Facilitation Society set up at Vashi in Mumbai at a cost of Rs 25 lakh has been lying unused for the last two years. UP accounts for close to 50 per cent of the potato produced in India.