There are 136 sugar mills lying sick that should be given financial help to revive and modernise by utilising the Sugar Development Fund (SDF), a Parliamentary panel has told the Food Ministry, while noting under-utilisation of the fund in 2016-17. Out of the 136 sick units, 110 mills are in the cooperative sector.

“The Budget estimate for 2016-17 under the Sugar Development Fund was ₹550 crore and it was reduced to ₹491.95 crore at the revised estimate stage, and the actual expenditure was only ₹327.12 crore,” the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Food Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution, headed by JC Divakar Reddy, said in its 15th report on Demand for Grants for the Ministry, tabled in the Parliament.

“There are about 136 sick sugar units in the country that could avail loan from the SDF for their revival and modernisation. The Committee fail to understand how the department could not fully utilise even the revised estimate,” the report said. In its reply to the panel, the Ministry cited non-availability of raw material, poor recovery from sugarcane, lack of modernisation, high cost of working capital, high State advices prices, among others, as the reasons for the sick mills.

“Out of 722 installed sugar mills in the country, 204 had not operated due to various reasons, including financial crunch…,” the Ministry said, adding that “during the current sugar season 2016-17, so far only 477 sugar mills (as on February 8, 2017) were in operation.”

According to the report, out of the 136 sick sugar mills, 66 are in Maharashtra, 17 in Karnataka, 13 in Uttar Pradesh, 11 in Andhra Pradesh, seven each in Punjab and Uttarakhand, six in Haryana, two each in Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha and one each in Gujarat, Bihar and Goa.

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