In a major relief to commodity futures market players, the Rajasthan government has decided to exempt all the warehouses registered with Warehouse Development and Regulatory Authority from the stock limit recently imposed on pulses.
“The Government has decided to exempt commodities kept in regulated warehouses (registered with WDRA) from stock holding limits under the Essential Commodity Act, 1955, subject to the condition that these warehouses will publish information of stock available with them on real time basis,” said a notification issued by the Rajasthan government on Friday.
All the cases pending against the regulated warehouses meeting the criteria would be closed and those already decided should not be re-opened,” said the note signed by Akash Tomar, Deputy Secretary, Rajasthan.
Earlier, the State government has extended the deadline for abiding by the stock limit to July 15 and increased the stock limit to 400 tonnes against the earlier 250 tonnes.
Of the 400 tonnes, a stockist may hold up to 200 tonnes of any one of the pulses – chana, tur and urad.
On June 22, the State issued a notification levying a stock limit of 250 tonnes on pulses. It was suppose to be effective from July 7 till September 30.
However, the notification did not exempt warehouses regulated by WDRA from the stock limit.
The agriculture-focused commodity futures exchange, NCDEX, has 26 accredited warehouses at Bikaner and Sri Ganganagar, the largest pulses trading hub.
Of these warehouses, 25 are registered with WDRA. Currently, chana is the only pulse traded on commodity exchange platforms.