Government taking steps to check onion prices: Nirmala Sitharaman

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said in Lok Sabha that the government has taken a host of measures including imports to deal with the rising prices of onion. She said that there are several structural issues related to storage of onions and the government is trying to addressed them. 

The Minister was replying to the debate on the first batch of Supplementary Demands for Grants. Prices of onions prices in many places have crossed Rs 100 per kg because of shortage.

Steps taken by the government to check rising prices of onion include ban on exports, imposition of stock limit, import and transfer of onion from surplus to deficit area.

She also said that due to implementation of direct benefit transfer scheme, the government has been able to save Rs 1.41 lakh crore in the last five years.

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The government plugged all loopholes through DBT and "all dalals and middlemen have been eliminated from the system", she said.

Lok Sabha later passed the first batch of Supplementary Demands for Grants allowing the government to spend an additional Rs 21,246.16 crore, including over Rs 8,820 crore in the newly formed Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh in the current fiscal ending March 2020.

The total cash outgo will be about Rs 19,000 crore. The government has sought Rs 8,820.62 crore as grants for Union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh in lieu of the erstwhile state's share of 14th Finance Commission Award.

Another Rs 4,557 crore will be infused in the IDBI Bank through recapitalisation bonds, while Rs 2,500 crore will go into recapitalisation of state-owned insurance companies.

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