He said during 1997-98 and 1998-99, India imported 33,226 million tonnes and 5,79,073 million tonnes of sugar respectively from Pakistan. However, no sugar has been imported during the period on the government account, he said. The minister said various private business houses may be importing sugar from Pakistan but no information about their imports from Pakistan was available with the government.

However, public sector undertaking PEC Ltd, which is under the administrative control of ministry of commerce, has imported sugar from Pakistan under open general licence on behalf of the private parties, he said. Minister of state for consumer affairs and public distribution, Sriram Chauhan said the overall procurement of wheat during the rabi marketing season 2000-01 has been estimated at 151 lakh tonnes. He said the government plans to procure about 12 million tonnes of wheat from Punjab and Haryana during the rabi marketing season 2000-01.