Telangana: Political Parties Embroiled in Row Over Persistent Urea Shortage in State

Hyderabad: A severe urea shortage has hit markets across Telangana at a time when agricultural operations in the state have peaked, aided by bountiful rains.

As the issue has gathered momentum, the state's three main parties – the ruling Congress, the main opposition Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) and the BJP – have become embroiled in a political row over it.

As the sowing of paddy, the principal crop in the state, is nearing completion, farmers have expected adequate availability of urea at outlets in their villages and nearby towns, but their hopes have been belied.

Long, serpentine queues of farmers and their family members – including women and children – in front of outlets beginning early in the day, and many of them returning home empty-handed after a long wait, have illustrated the gravity of the situation.

Those standing upfront in queue are handed only two bags of urea weighing 45 kilograms each, which is just enough for an initial round of spraying over one acre of sowed crop that must be done within ten to 15 days.

Even these two bags are given only upon production of both Aadhaar and a passbook that indicates one's land title. If either document is missing, only one bag is given.

So far, so good for small farmers with few landholdings. Instead, it is those farmers who own ten acres or more of farmland who are worst-hit by the ongoing shortage of urea, which is considered a key component of agricultural inputs and is a tightly controlled commodity in the hands of the Union government that highly subsidises the fertiliser.

The supply of urea is also regulated at the point of sale in a 50:50 ratio between primary agricultural cooperative credit societies (PACSs) and dealers. Since the government has been dispatching stocks to PACSs in lorries, these societies have been crowded by desperate farmers. Advance information to PACSs about the arrival of trucks on specific days has caused people to rush to godowns, sometimes in the middle of the night.

Aiming for a high yield enabled by the healthy growth of their crop, farmers have shown a strong preference for urea over organic fertilisers and complexes like diammonium phosphate (DAP) for principal crops like paddy, cotton and maize.

While an ideal combination of fertiliser for an acre of crop is a spray of 65 kg of urea and 35 kg of DAP, farmers have tended to spend 90 to 135 kg of urea alone in the hope of reaping higher yields, said Kommineni Narsimha Rao, a farmer from the Konijerla village in Khammam district.

The Union government has retained full control over the allotment of urea to states as it extends a subsidy of Rs 1,900 per bag of 45 kg. Farmers shell out only Rs 266 per bag and another Rs 10 towards hamali (porter) charges to transport the fertiliser from the godown.

This control has often led to bitterness between state governments and the Union government. In Telangana's case, agriculture minister Tummala Nageswara Rao has alleged that the BJP-led Union government is biased against the state's Congress government for political reasons.

He said the state had an opening stock of 1.92 lakh tonnes of urea in April. This was the stock left over from the previous rabi season up to March.

The Union government allotted 8.3 lakh tonnes to Telangana for the current kharif season but has supplied only 5.12 lakh tonnes till August, said Nageswara Rao.

Together with the carryover of 1.92 lakh tonnes, the total available stock in five months has only reached 7.04 lakh tonnes against a demand of 10.48 lakh tonnes for an expected cropped area of 1.32 crore acres across the state, the minister said. After distributing 6.52 lakh tonnes of urea to farmers, some 52,000 tonnes now remain in stock.

Nageswara Rao said he had personally met Union chemicals and fertilisers minister J.P. Nadda twice to seek a higher allotment to Telangana but to no avail.

Meanwhile, Congress MPs from Telangana staged a protest in parliament for two days during the monsoon session seeking urea support to the state. Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi also participated on one occasion.

This led to Nadda announcing an immediate relief of 50,000 tonnes on Wednesday (August 20), which was expected to arrive in a couple of days. The first shipment of 10,800 tonnes was dispatched from Karnataka, while Coromandel International Limited was directed to arrange three more shipments.

The BJP shot back at Nageswara Rao, accusing the latter of furnishing false figures. Its state president N. Ramchander Rao claimed that the Union government in fact had supplied more urea to the state than it is required to.

He said the requirement of urea in the last rabi season was only 9.87 lakh tonnes but that the Union government had supplied 12.47 lakh tonnes instead. He promised to resign if he was proved wrong and dared the minister to do the same in return.

Ramchander Rao added that the Israel-Iran conflict as well as security issues faced by vessels in the Red Sea had hindered imports, which was one of the factors behind a sluggish market, but claimed that the Union government continued supplying fertiliser nonetheless.

Alongside, the Ramagundam Fertiliser Corporation Limited's plant at Ramagundam in Telangana has had to shut down a couple of times this year. The plant had a production capacity of 11.95 lakh tonnes per annum.

Union minister of state for chemicals and fertilisers Anupriya Patel meanwhile claimed in parliament in response to a question that urea availability in the state in the ongoing kharif season is “adequate”, which the state government has contested.

She also said that 22.15 lakh tonnes of urea were available in Telangana in the 2024-25 fiscal against a requirement of 20.3 lakh tonnes, although some state Congress officials have disputed this, saying the figure also accounts for other fertilisers.

Amid the volley of charges between the Congress and the BJP, the BRS too has joined the row, alleging inefficiency on part of the state government in aiding farmers.

BRS working president K.T. Rama Rao said the party will vote in the coming vice presidential election depending on which of the Congress or BJP supplies two lakh tonnes of urea to farmers before September 9, when the poll is scheduled.

He said the ten-year rule of the BRS had never witnessed such a poor situation. The BRS government took timely steps coordinating with the Union government, railways and producers, he added.

BRS workers staged rasta roko protests at several places on highways to express solidarity with farmers. The party highlighted the fact that farmers had left their footwear, Aadhaar cards, passbooks and other belongings in front of PACSs and fertiliser shops to reserve their places in queue as a sign of the pathetic situation agriculture is in under Congress rule.

Amidst concerns of hoarding by dealers, the police have also conducted raids on shops and cancelled the licences of a dozen outlets for various malpractices. In some cases, dealers were found to be basing sales of urea to those of other fertilisers and pesticides. That is, only those who agreed to buy other inputs were supplied urea.

M. Venkateswara Reddy, a farmer downstream of the Jurala irrigation project at the Narsamdoddi village in Jogulamba Gadwal district, said he paid Rs 350 per bag from a retail outlet to meet part of his requirement for ten acres of his holding.

Manchana Pandaiah, a dealer in Jadcherla, denied that shops were selling urea at over Rs 266 a bag. He said the queues at outlets were mainly on account of panic buying by farmers.

Another dealer who did not want to be named, however, admitted diversion of urea from retail outlets for non-agricultural purposes like production of paints, varnish, plywood, beer, poultry farming, fodder as well as fish and prawn culturing.

He said the demand for urea had gone up manifold due to increase in paddy cultivation at the cost of cotton and maize. The cropped area of paddy has gone up from 23 lakh acres in 2014 when Telangana was formed to 67 lakh acres now. An incentive of Rs 500 per quintal for fine varieties of paddy has also driven farmers to cultivating the crop.

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