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Even as the Agriculture Minister, Mr Sharad Pawar, demanded lifting of the cotton export ban, the Textiles Ministry on Tuesday said an inter-ministerial panel will review the prohibition order on Friday.
The Union Textiles Secretary, Ms Kiran Dhingra, told reporters on Tuesday that there is no move to impose a ban on cotton yarn exports. She said during the March 9 review of the decision to ban cotton exports, the ministerial panel will look into the demand and supply situation.
Earlier in the day, Mr Pawar expressed his displeasure over being “kept in the dark” regarding the notification of the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (or DGFT which falls under the Commerce Ministry headed by Mr Anand Sharma) on banning cotton exports.
Mr Pawar, who is the President of the Nationalist Congress Party, told reporters that he learnt about the Government's move only after the DGFT had issued the notification. He said that he has asked the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, to intervene and sort out the issue.
Alleging that the move was taken without proper consultations and was therefore ‘highly objectionable', Mr Pawar said such decisions should be taken only after discussion by the Cabinet Committee on Prices or the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs as it is done with other commodities such as sugar, wheat and rice.
Mr Pawar said that farmers in Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh are in trouble because traders have halted their purchases anticipating that prices will decline even further. He said that the cotton export ban was therefore “harmful” to the farmers.
The Textiles Secretary said that Cotton Corporation of India has been advised to protect farmer's interests by procuring cotton in all mandis if prices fall below the minimum support price.
The Secretary said that cotton exports at 94 lakh bales so far has brought down the carryover stock for next season to 36 lakh bales.
The informal Group of Ministers had in April 2010 laid down that a carry forward balance of 50 lakh bales should be maintained and only surplus cotton stock should be exported, she said.
The Commerce Ministry had said that on Monday that the ban was necessitated as almost 94 lakh bales of cotton had already shipped out against an estimated export surplus of 84 lakh bales. The ban followed higher than anticipated exports and apprehensions of a tendency of hoarding the item in bonded warehouses abroad, it said.
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