Govt scotches reports of shifting Tobacco Board out of A P

New Delhi, Dec 13 (UNI) The Government today flatly denied in Rajya Sabha that it had a proposal to shift Tobacco Board from Guntur to some other place.

Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh in a written reply to a question of Mr G K Sanghi said there was no such proposal.

To a question of Mr P Madhu, if there was any peer Committee recommended reduction in staff in Tobacco Board and withdrawal of Minimum Support Price within three years, he said the Committee had recommended that the production of Fine Cut Variety (FCV) tobacco be regulated and transition period of three years be adopted for moving to deregulated and market driven regime. The MSP system must be continued during the transition. It had also suggested to conduct internal work study for staff requirement.

On the exports of FCV tobacco by Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, the two major tobacco producing states of the country, the Minister said that based on the information received from the exporters, Karnataka exported 41,811 tonnes of FCV tobacco valued at Rs 397 crore for 2005-06 while Andhra Pradesh 67,764 tonnes worth Rs 460 crores.

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