By Our Correspondent
Sarlahi, Dec.14: Indushankar Sugar Mill in Hariwan of Sarlahi worshiped the machine on Monday to begin crushing sugarcane.
Yoganarayan Rajak, manager of the mill, said that machine was worshipped at an auspicious hour to run the mill smoothly in the current season.
According to him, the machine was worshiped at 11 am on Monday morning.

The machine is worshiped every year before operating the sugar industry. Industry operators, employees and farmers attended the machine worshipping ceremony.

Indushankar, which crushed 2.2 million quintals of sugarcane last year, has set a target of crushing same amount of sugarcane this year as well. The mill has a capacity to crush 50,000 quintals of sugarcane a day. If the price of sugarcane is fixed immediately, preparations are being made to start sugarcane crushing within December 25 to 30, said Rajak.
The Godaita-based Mahalakshmi Sugar Mill and Annapurna Sugar Mill Dhankaul of Sarlahi are in standby position to operate their crushing machines.

Annapurna Sugar Mill could not come into operation last year for failing to pay dues of the sugarcane farmers. It is said that Annapurna Sugar Mill is also preparing to come into operation as the mill has been bought by another businessman.
The government is making final preparations to fix the price of sugarcane for this year.

Sugarcane farmers have demanded that the price of sugarcane be fixed at Rs. 650 per quintal this year citing a rise in production cost.