The wheat which got wet in the rain at Vadodara railway yard can be retrieved fully by drying it, Union Minister of State for Railways Bharatsinh Solanki said here on Monday.
BJP MP Balkrishna Shukla had claimed yesterday that some 54,000 wheat bags got soaked, because Food Corporation of India and Central Warehousing Corporation (CWC) had kept them in the open.
Solanki said here that the goods train loaded with wheat bags from Mandideep (Madhya Pradesh) reached Vadodara goods shed on August 10.
The wagons were being unloaded by a private contractor and the bags were to be taken to a depot located about 4.5 km from the shed. According to Solanki, there were total of 54,000 bags, of which 30,000 were moved to the depot and remaining were lying at the shed when the rain started.
According to V K Tyagi, regional manager of CWC, even these bags were covered with tarpaulin, and only about 2,000 bags on the sides of the heaps became wet.
Solanki said that according to CWC officials, the wheat was not damaged, and it could be dried at the depot.
Union Agriculture Ministry would decide how to use this wheat later, he said.