LAHORE: Farmers in different parts of the country are complaining of overcharging on urea and DAP fertilisers.

The federal government had announced subsidised rate of Rs1,400 for a 50kg bag of urea instead of regular rate of Rs1,800 and Rs2,400 to Rs2,500 for diammonium phosphate`s 50kg bag against the previous market rate of Rs3,100.

A majority of farmers in Punjab are getting subsidised fertilisers with few complaints of overcharging being reported to the helpline (080015000/04299200773) of the Punjab Agriculture department.

However, complaints have been received from south Punjab and Lahore districts.

Interviews with the farmersreveal that some dealers are charging up to Rs1,650 for urea and up to Rs2,800 for the DAP.

`I have recently purchased 70 bags of the DAP for Rs2,700 to Rs2,800 per bag and the dealers claimed they had bought it at higher rates from the company, said Lalzada of Akora Khattak, Noshehra, who had sown potato and cabbage recently. He, however, said urea fertiliser was available at the declared price in their area.

Lalzada said he had officially lodged his complaint to the assistant commissioner`s office about overcharging by the dealers but to no avail. He further said dealers of all companies were also overcharging on the DAP in Mardan, the biggest market of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

A Rahim Sanjrani, a cultivator from Sanghar, Sindh, said he hadrecently bought eight bags of urea at Rs1,650 per bag and a dozen of the DAP at Rs2,800 from a local dealer. He said the farmers in Shahdadpur, Sanghar, had no access to ofhcials concerned for lodging their complaints and they even did not know the process.

However, Muhammad Amjad, a cultivator from Faisalabad district, said he got both fertilizers at the subsidised rates.

An employee of a major fertiliser company said the government had announced Rs300 subsidy on the DAP but international downfall in prices got the price down from Rs3,100 to Rs2,800 to further reduce it to R s2,400. He said all fertiliser companies were importing the DAP at cheaper rates nowadays.

A source in the Punjab Agriculture department told Dawnthat the complaints regarding overcharging were being brought to the notice of highest authorities who were directing the district officers agriculture to ensure prices or initiate action against violators. He said majority of complaints against overcharging were coming from south Punjab and Lahore district.

Punjab Agriculture Minister Dr Farrukh Javed claimed that both subsidized fertilisers were available in abundance throughout province and he had yet to receive any complaint of overcharging. He said the products of Fauji Fertilisers Company were not under subsidised package announced by the federal government in June 2016.

Mr Javed claimed he was ensuringthe subsided prices throughhis farmers` feedback farmers instead of depending on the department`s field formations.