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GUNTUR, Aug. 2

THE Tobacco farmers in Andhra Pradesh have urged the State Government to impose a special cess of 1 per cent on tobacco brought into the State for processing. They have also sought to treat the cess as their contribution to the proposed price stabilisation fund.

At a meeting convened by the Tobacco Board here on Friday to discuss the issue, the Andhra Pradesh Virginia Tobacco Growers' Associaton made the suggestion to the board and urged it to convey it to the State Government. Dr Y. Sivaji, President of the association, said the recent Supreme Court judgment in the Bihar Government versus the ITC case had made it clear that the State Governments could impose such a cess on tobacco and the AP Government should go ahead and impose the cess.

He said the Chief Minister had recently responded positively when he had broached the subject with him and the board should also persuade the State to go ahead with the proposal. A price stabilisation fund should be set up immediately with the board contributing the rest of the sum.

However, Dr Sivaji clarified that the farmers had not given up on the demand conveyed to the Union Government to collect one per cent of the total cigarette sale proceeds from the trade to set up the fund, but as it was a long drawn-out and time-consuming process, the farmers had come up with the suggestion. ``Ultimately, setting up the fund with a corpus of Rs 100 crore or so realised in that manner can be the only lasting solution to the problems plaguing the market,'' he said.

At a meeting of the chairmen of the commodity boards in the last week on July 24 in New Delhi on the issue, a proposal had also been made to create a special purpose vehicle for setting up the tobacco price stabilisation fund, with 26 per cent contribution from the board and an equal amount from the growers, 40 per cent from the trade and 8 per cent from the financial institutions.

The Tobacco Board convened the meeting here on Friday to elicit the views of farmers. Dr P. Dayachary, the board Chairman, presided over the meeting.

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