NEYAZ ELAHI
SRINAGAR: In the garb of Exhibition Cum Sale program, Sher-i-Kashmir University of Agriculture Sciences and Technology (SKUAST) Srinagar, looted farmers of their hard earned money on Sunday without providing them plants and other stuff they had paid for.
Scores of farmers from far flung areas of Kashmir Valley Monday arrived at the office of CNS narrating the episode how Horticulture wing of SKUAST looted their money.
They said that SKUAST had given much hype to their Exhibition Cum Sale program that they conducted in their premises on Sunday.
“There were different counters on which hundreds of farmers deposited their money up to the tune of Rs 3000 to get their desired stuff including plants, fish, maize, chicken etc.
They said that Horticulture wing had established four counters out of which three were cash counters while the fourth one was set up to provide plants of different varieties to the farmers.
“We had arrived to buy different varieties of plants including Kiwi, Cashewnut, Fig, Plum and for that purpose we paid cash at the counter. To our shock, these varieties were available in limited quantity and we didn’t get anything. Even cash was not returned to us. It was a big scam. At least they collected Rs 30 lakhs from the farmers and didn’t return the money on the pretext that it has gone into Treasury,” the aggrieved farmers told news agency CNS.
The farmers demanded probe into the incident. They sought intervention of Agriculture Minister.
When contacted, Vice Chancellor SKUAST, Prof Nazir Ahmed said that they were not expecting such a huge number of buyers while the plants and other stuff were available in limited numbers.
“Those who didn’t get the material even after paying the money can contact me,” he added. (CNS)
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