AP government has no power to take over Sangam dairy

TDP national official spokesperson K Pattabhi Ram on Tuesday asserted that the Andhra Pradesh government had no right to meddle in the affairs of the Sangam dairy since it had no shares in the milk producers’ company which was being owned by over 1.2 lakh dairy farmers spread over the Krishna and Guntur districts.

Pattabhi clarified that all the lands currently in possession of the Sangam dairy were bought with the funds collected from the lakhs of milk farmers who donated a day’s milk collection in those days. At one time, it was true that Sangam received the AP government funds of Rs 81 lakh but the same was repaid by taking a loan from the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) in 1997 itself.

Addressing a press conference here, the TDP leader asked how the IAS officers were simply giving illegal orders without cross checking the facts. The latest GO 19 was totally in violation of the Companies Act under which Sangam dairy was formed into a producers’ company in order to pass on greater benefits to the shareholders. The officers responsible for issuing such unlawful orders would have to face legal consequences in future. They would have to pay a heavy penalty for blindly obeying the orders of an arrogant Chief Minister like Jagan Mohan Reddy, he said.

Pattabhi clarified to the YSRCP government that 367 societies of farmers owned Sangam dairy while Dhulipalla Narendra Kumar became its chairman only after they elected him. It was after Narendra became chairman that the turnover of Sangam dairy increased from Rs 200 crore to Rs. 1,000 crore. The chilling centres also went up from three to 30. In the last 10 years, Sangam dairy has paid a bonus of Rs 206 crore to its share holding milk farmers. It was not a private ltd company nor a proprietary concern. The government had no jurisdiction over it.

The TDP leader questioned the locus standi of the Tenali sub-collector to come and take charge of the Sangam dairy forgetting the fact that the NDDB has formed it into a producers’ company. The NDDB has formed many such milk producers’ companies across the country. Can the AP government arrest the NDDB officials also? The Jagan Mohan Reddy regime was taking hasty and mindless steps just because it was expecting setbacks from the courts on the issue of the CBI case against Dhulipalla Narendra Kumar, he added.

Pattabhi said that the present illegal attack on the Sangam dairy was only because the Chief Minister fully knew that the Amul company would not be able to gain any business in the state as long as Sangam was strongly in position. There was nothing wrong for Sangam dairy management to allot 10 acre land for the Dhulipalla Veeraiah Trust as it was a decision of the producers’ company to construct a hospital for the benefit of poor farmers.

The state government had no shares in the company and hence no say in the matters of its management, he claimed.