India wheat purchases up 24 percent on-year from Apr 1-May 4

India's state-run Food Corp. bought 20.65 million tonnes of wheat from April 1 to May 4, up 24 percent on-year, a government official said Tuesday.

About 95 percent of the wheat sold in local markets in the period has been bought by Food Corp.

The federal government increased the state-set purchase price of wheat to Rs10,800 (US$218) a tonne this year from Rs10,000 (US$202) per tonne, which has encouraged farmers to sell more grain to the government.