Crackdown on Punjab retailers to check misuse of subsidised urea
The checks came after direct orders from the Union ministry of chemicals and fertilisers, following concerns over a significant increase in urea sales by certain retailers.
Deepinder Singh, chief agriculture officer of Hoshiarpur, who has been assigned Sangrur for checks, stated, 'We have to check 259 retailers included in the list in Sangrur district due to concern of increase in urea consumption, which has been found to be more than the previous year. We need to specifically check that the sale of urea to farmers is genuine and that it is not being used by industries, which are supposed to buy urea at a fixed price, not subsidised. If anybody is found to be using the subsidised urea, strict action will be taken against him.'
The decision has been taken followed by a directive by the Union department of chemicals and fertilisers to the agriculture department of Punjab. A copy of the letter is with HT dated July 24 addressed from the Union ministry of chemicals and fertilisers to the administrative secretary of Punjab's agriculture department states: 'As part of our regular monitoring under the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) framework, an analysis of urea PoS sale data for the period from April 1 to July 20, 2025, has been conducted. Based on this analysis, a list of fertiliser retailers falling in the top 10 percentile, in terms of urea PoS sales, has been identified. Furthermore, the department has also observed a significant increase in sales by certain retailers in the said period when compared to the corresponding period in 2024-25.'
As per the orders, the Punjab agriculture department has been instructed to verify and check the operations and sale records of these identified retailers and submit the report by August 5. Following this, the director of the agriculture and farmer welfare, Punjab, through a letter released on July 25 stated the duties of the officials, including the chief agriculture officer and agriculture development officer. Notably, chief agriculture officers of the districts have been reshuffled. They have been asked to send an action-taken report on August 1.
As per the information, the checks aim to ensure fair and transparent fertiliser distribution and to prevent any diversion or misuse of subsidised urea, a critical agricultural input.
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