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Heated debate in JS over rice price

Staff Correspondent
Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury and her predecessor BNP lawmaker MK Anwar yesterday locked horns in parliament over prices of rice and production of food grains during the regimes of past Awami League (AL) and BNP governments.
The debate kept the House quite heated for sometime defying the air conditioning.
MK Anwar referred to information published by the agriculture ministry while Matia Chowdhury said the BNP government manipulated the data by turning the Bureau of Statistics, and Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation (BADC) into puppets.
Speaking on a call attention notice, Anwar said the incumbent agriculture minister in her speech eartier had claimed that prices of rice had been between Tk 9 and Tk 9.50 a kg during the tenure of the last AL government between 1996 and 2001, whicK increased toTk22 to Tk 23 during the successive BNP regime.
Anwar claimed Matia's claim is wrong according to the information published by the agriculture ministry which says prices of rice has never been belowTk 10 a kg since 1991.
MK Anwar, also a former agriculture minister, labelled Matia’s information as incorrect
He said Matia earlier had told the House that production of food grains was 2.64 crore metric tonnes in the last financial year of 2005-'06 under the immediate past BNP-led alliance government.
But the information disclosed by the agriculture ministry says the production of food grains was 2.77 crore metric tonnes in the last fiscal year of the BNP-led government," Anwar rebutted.
Referring to the agriculture ministry report, Anwar went on to say that production of food grains was 2.69 crore metric tonnes during the fiscal year of 2000-'01 under the past AL regime.
"Providing incorrect information in the House is not desired," Anwar quipped. He said Matia Chowdhury’ also alleged corruption and nepotism in the agriculture ministry during the past BNP government, although she failed to mention any specific case.
In response. Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury brushed aside MK Anwar's claims saying the erstwhile BNP government manipulated the statistics. "If they had produced more food grains, then the prices of rice would not increase to 20 taka to 22 taka from the previous prices of 9 taka to 10 taka," she said.
Matia said the former finance minister of the BNP government defended the shortage of food grains in an effort to receive foreign aid. "But what he did not mention is that they got commissions from food grains import," Matia threw a rather heavy blow.
On corruption in the agriculture sector, the agriculture minister said she sent a file to the Anti - corruption Commission to probe the unbridled corruption' in BADC during the immediate past BNP government's regime.
As Matia blasted the former agriculture minister for his speech, MK Anwar took the floor again and said he would apologise, if the information disclosed by the agriculture ministry is proven wrong.
He also demanded formation of a parliamentary body to authenticate the information provided by ministers in the House .