New Delhi, April 27: The supreme court on Monday dismissed petitions by the sugar industry in Maharashtra challenging the constitutional validity of an amendment to the sugar factories reservation of areas supply order 1984 permitting non-members of cooperative societies to sell their produce outside the reserved areas.The petition was dismissed by a division bench comprising justices GN Ray and M Srinivasan.
With the dismissal of the petition, non-members of cooperatives are free to sell their cane crop to factories outside the reserved areas and thus get the market price for their produce.
Even members of the cooperatives would be now free to sell their excess produce to the factories outside the reserved areas after meeting the share ratio requirement of factories inside these areas.
This would obviate the destruction of excess crop of the members which till now was being burnt.The judgement comes as a relief to the state government as it had been so far paying compensation to the farmers for theexcess crop destroyed, putting a strain on the exchequer.
Cane growers had come out in support of the amendment and farmers leader Sharad Joshi was one of the interveners in the petition by the Sugar Federation.
The amendment by the state government was necessitated as factories in the reserved areas were not accepting crop grown by non-members of cooperatives and even the excess crop by the members.
The State federation of Sugar Factories however alleged in its petition before the apex court that the state government had "dereserved" the sugarcane areas attached to the factories for political reasons and with a view to derail the cooperative movement in the state.
Senior counsel FS Nariman appearing for the sugar factories had urged the court during arguments to strike down the amendment as it was in contravention of the sugarcane control order 1966 passed by the central government under the essential commodities act.
The sugarcane control order and the subsequent state law of 1984 had providedthat factories should procure cane only from the reserved areas in order to strengthen the cooperative movement. The state government counsel had, however, contended that there was no truth in the allegation that the amendment was meant to destroy the cooperative movement in the state. He said only 20 per cent of growers were non-members of the cooperatives and the amendment would be applicable only to them.
However, members who were now being forced to destroy their excess crop could now dispose it of to factories outside the reserved areas.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
