Bhubaneswar, Aug. 24: Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik today urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to release the full quota of urea as per the central allocation to the state by the end of September.

“At least one lakh metric tonne of fertilisers may be supplied within the next week,” Naveen said.

Odisha has been a facing a fertiliser crisis, but there are also claims that the state government had not taken adequate steps to prevent hoarding and black-marketing. Naveen’s letter came in the wake of raids conducted by the vigilance and the agriculture department against fertiliser dealers.

In his letter, Naveen said that even urea was not being supplied to Odisha in adequate quantity despite special allocations by the Centre for Kharif, 2012.

“Though the Union ministry of chemical and fertilisers has committed to supply 4.5 lakh metric tonne of urea from April to September, the actual supply till August 23 was only 1.99 lakh metric tonne, which is less than half of what was promised,” Naveen said.

He said that as per the “supply plan” of the Central government, 71,000 metric tonne of imported urea was to be supplied to Odisha during August, but the ships carrying the goods are still at sea.

Urging personal intervention of the Prime Minister, the chief minister said: “Unless the urea is supplied on time, farmers of Odisha will face severe problems.”

Naveen also urged Singh to consider a downward revision in the prices of chemical fertilisers to safeguard the interest of the farming community.

Except for urea, the prices of other major fertilisers such as di ammonium phosphate, muriate of potash and other complex fertilisers have increased by more than 100 per cent since April last year.

Odisha agriculture minister Debi Prasad Mishra had also met Union cabinet minister for chemicals and fertilisers M.K. Alagiri and apprised him of the shortage of fertilisers in the state.

On the other hand, around 21,000 fertiliser bags have vanished from the godowns of traders across the state, according to vigilance officials who checked stocks following raids.

Each bags contained 50kg of fertiliser.

The vigilance department swung into action following a series of complaints about dealers hoarding and black-marketing fertiliser to make huge profits.

The Union minister of state for chemical and fertilisers Srikant Jena had suggested to Mishra to check hoarding of fertilisers before demanding more.

To create an artificial fertiliser crisis at the time of sowing, the wholesalers and retailers had indulged in illegal hoarding and black-marketing of fertiliser.

Following a tip-off, the vigilance conducted a state- wide raid for four days from August 18. The department conducted raids on the godowns of 12 retailers and found there was shortage of 21,396 fertiliser bags against the stock lists.