Purnea, March 6: Fertiliser worth Rs 50 lakh were seized in a raid on four different godowns. Around 12,500 bags of fertiliser, each weighing 50kg, were recovered.

The raid was conducted on the directive of the district administration. A team comprising the district agriculture officer, station house officer, a team from Sadar police station led by Sadar sub-divisional officer Kundan Kumar raided the godowns at Goyal Market near Gulab Bag in Purnea.

Under the anti-hoarding operation, huge amount of fertilisers were recovered from Ankit Fertilizers, Vikas Trading, Hanuman Store and Godavari Enterprises and a case was lodged against them under Sadar police station.

The confiscated fertilisers comprised primarily of 1,551 bags of urea, 2,145 bags of diammonium phosphate, 3,075 bags of nitrogen-phosphorous-potassium, 3,959 bags of potash, 225 bags of ammonium sulphate and 1,527 bags of various other fertilisers.

Diammonium phosphate manufactured by Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited was distributed to the farmers through the chairman of Primary Agriculture Co-operative Society (PACS) and it was hoarded in private godowns.

“Around 450 tons of fertilisers were supplied to Purnea, which was adequate to meet the demands of farmers and we did not think that illegally hoarded fertilisers at private godowns was supplied by PACS,” the district agriculture officer, Chandra Shekhar Prasad told The Telegraph.

“However, hoarders of fertilisers had hatched a plan of creating crises in the market so that they could sell them in the black market and get heavy benefits,” he said.