Patna, March 28: Fifteen closed sugar mills of the Bihar State Sugar Corporation may not have produced a grain of sugar for the past two decades but they still continue to be a subject of bitter debate between the ruling NDA and opposition RJD.

A question related to revival of the sick sugar mill at Bihta, around 20km from Patna, raised by Bhai Birendar led to trading of charges and counter-charges between members of the ruling coalition and the RJD members, who staged a walkout. The treasury bench, led by deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi, alleged that most of the sugar mills closed down during the RJD regime, while the RJD alleged that the government had actually sold off prime land to “land mafia” without ensuring that the sugar industry would be revived.

Responding to the question, sugarcane development minister Awadhesh Prasad Kushwaha said Bihta Sugar Mill had been leased out to Delhi-based company M/s Pristile Logistic Infra Project Company to start a container depot there. He declared that the company had already paid Rs 23.16 crore for a 60-year lease and the government had accepted the letter of intent for the same. He added that the state government had got all the sugar mills accessed by SBI Cab and the company had maintained that reopening of a sugar mill there was unviable.

However, the RJD MLA said Bihta Sugar Mill had around 680 acres of land under its control and the government should insist that the private party starts an industry, which is associated with farmers, so that they are benefited from it. He said sugarcane was a cash crop for farmers there.

Modi intervened to stress that the handing over of sugar mills had been transparent during the NDA regime. “Advertisements were issued twice for inviting tenders,” he said, pointing out that no private company was ready to restart sugar mills at several places and the government had to give an option for private parties to open other industries instead. However, Leader of the Opposition Abdul Bari Siddiqui alleged that the sugar mills were being given out to land mafia at throwaway prices. “You (the government) are giving them away so that they can sell them off in plots and even open private schools there,” he alleged. Modi retorted that most of the mills had closed down during the RJD regime and that Siddiqui had not shown any concern for farmers at that time. The RJD MLAs protested and staged an angry walkout at this.

The sugarcane minister declared production of sugar had doubled in Bihar during the NDA regime and that the sugar mills at Lauria and Sugauli had been revived. However, during the question hour, the minister conceded that there were no private party takers for reviving sugar mills in Gopalganj and Gaya.

Siddiqui later alleged that the Nitish government had promised to reopen all the 15 sugar mills. “But now prime land is being given away to construction builders, schools and for other non-industrial work,” he alleged.