Ram Vilas Paswan

Stating that licence for FPS is being given by the state government, he told chief ministers that allotment of FPS should be done as per the reservation policy.

FMCG firms Dabur and Emami welcomed the rates on commonly used consumer items stating it would be beneficial but said more clarity is needed to understand overall impact.

Wheat inventories at ports have climbed to a record high of about 1.8 million tonnes, mainly cargoes shipped from Australia and the Black Sea region, trade and industry sources said.

The sugar subsidy to AAY and other beneficiaries via PDS was discontinued with effect from March 2017. The Union food and consumer affairs ministry as well as some states had been keen on its continuance for at least AAY families.

Nearly 4 lakh tonnes of tur dal have already been procured from Maharashtra under the price stabilisation fund (PSF) operated by the food ministry. The state chief minister had last month sought procurement of additional 2 lakh tonnes under the PSF in view of the bumper crop of 20.35 lakh tonnes.

Briefing reporters following his party's national executive meeting on April 29 and 30 in Dadra and Nagar Haveli, he heaped praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his "pro-Dalit" measures.

Paswan's comments follow a meeting with Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis who sought hike in customs duty on tur dal saying farmers are struggling to get even the minimum support price (MSP) because of record output.

Food and Consumer Affairs Minister Ram Vilas Paswan said changes in prices of the 22 items including pulses, onion and tomato vis-a-vis on the day of demonetisation are being monitored on a daily basis.

On December 8, the government had reduced customs duty on wheat to zero from 10 percent to boost domestic availability and check retail prices.

Mills in India, the world's biggest sugar producer, will churn out 20.3 million tonnes of the sweetener in the season to September 2017, the ISMA said last week, down 5 percent from its previous forecast and 13.2 percent lower than the estimate made in September 2016.

The government has sought explanation from companies selling packaged mineral water over different MRPs of bottles for various places and directed that the sale price should be same at airports, hotels and malls.

Paswan said there would be a bumper wheat production this year and the government has set a procurement target at 33 million tonnes for the 2017-18 marketing year, starting April.

The allocation for food subsidy has been increased to Rs 1.45 lakh crore next fiscal from Rs 1.3 lakh crore this year to provide for the new food law, which has been rolled out in the entire country, Food minister Ram Vilas Paswan said today.

As part of the exercise to move towards the uniform goods and services tax (GST), the Finance Ministry in its forthcoming budget is likely to abolish sugar cess, a levy which forms corpus of the Sugar Development Fund (SDF) and is used for modernisation and expansion of mills.

Although there is no provision under the existing law to take action against hotels/restaurants, consumers have the freedom not to pay the service charge and can decide not to eat there if they are informed in advance about it through the menu card itself.

Sugar prices in the local market have risen more than 10 percent in a month on an expected drop in the production after back-to-back drought ravaged cane crop in the top producing western state of Maharashtra.

With the National Food Security law being rolled out across the country, Paswan said the government will now focus on its proper implementation and complete major reforms in the PDS, including 100 percent Aadhar seeding of ration cards.

The government has recently scrapped import duty on wheat to boost domestic supplies and curb price rise. The private players has imported more than 1.7 million tonnes of wheat so far and more shipments are expected at zero Customs duty.