Centre seizes 35,000 bags of urea diverted from agricultural use

Being highly subsidised, there is always a tendency to divert urea towards non-agriculture purposes

More than seven years after the Centre made it mandatory for all domestic urea producers to make 100 per cent neem-coated urea, the government has seized around 35,000 bags of urea diverted for non-agriculture purposes in the last few months.

The ‘Flying Squad’, constituted by the Ministry of Fertilisers, has filed eight first information reports against the offenders and six people have been sent to jail.

The fertilisers have been seized from Haryana, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana, and Andhra Pradesh.

“The bags have been seized despite being neem-coated, for which investigation is on as to how they escaped scrutiny,” said