Urea and DAP: the answer says availability stayed adequate; its own table shows 105.14 lakh tonnes of DAP available in 2024-25 against 111.92 required

What was asked

The Lok Sabha asked the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers whether it had identified the regions where shortages of urea and DAP (di-ammonium phosphate) were reported in the last three years, state-wise and district-wise, with the remedial action taken; the cases registered against diversion, illegal sale and misuse of subsidised fertilizer; and its plans for imports, domestic production and subsidies. The Department of Fertilizers’ answer of 7 August 2026 (Unstarred Question 3380) says requirement is assessed each season by the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare with all the State Governments, that the department allocates supplies against it, and that “accordingly, the availability of Urea and DAP has remained adequate across the States during the last three years”. It gives two annexures: requirement, availability and DBT sales of urea and DAP by State and UT for 2023-24, 2024-25 and 2025-26, and the action states reported against malpractices from April to 31 July 2026.

The answer’s own test

Under its table the answer prints two tests: “Primary Indicator of comfortable availability: Availability > Requirement”, and “Secondary Indicator of comfortable availability: Availability > DBT Sales”. By the primary one, India as a whole did not have comfortable DAP availability in 2024-25. Availability was 105.14 lakh tonnes against a requirement of 111.92, a gap of 6.78 lakh tonnes, or 93.9% of what was required. DBT sales fell from 109.73 lakh tonnes in 2023-24 to 96.29, by 12.2%.

The shortfall was not in one place. Thirteen of the 36 States and UTs had less DAP available than required in 2024-25; 7 of them by a tenth of a lakh tonne or more: Madhya Pradesh (3.87), Uttar Pradesh (2.50), Rajasthan (1.39), Punjab (1.11), Gujarat (0.41), Maharashtra (0.37) and Haryana (0.31). Madhya Pradesh had 12.70 lakh tonnes against 16.57, 76.6% of its requirement, the largest gap of any state. Uttar Pradesh, which needs the most DAP, had 21.55 against 24.05.

By the secondary test the picture is different: DBT sales were not larger than availability in any row, for either fertilizer, in any year. The answer does not say which of its two tests its word “adequate” rests on, and it does not say why DAP availability fell short of the requirement it had assessed with the states.

Madhya Pradesh, three times

In 2025-26 India’s DAP availability recovered to 121.72 lakh tonnes against 110.42 required, but four rows were still below requirement: Goa, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Mizoram. Madhya Pradesh had 13.09 against 15.00, and Gujarat 5.82 against 6.30.

The department’s answer to Unstarred Question 3342, given the same day, repeats every urea and DAP figure of the three years and adds Kharif 2026, from 1 April to 3 August 2026. India had 44.60 lakh tonnes of DAP available against 37.17 required, but seven rows were below requirement, among them Madhya Pradesh (3.57 against 3.89) and Gujarat (2.35 against 2.63). Those two states were below requirement in 2024-25, in 2025-26 and in Kharif 2026. That answer, too, says availability “has remained adequate in the country”. Neither says why.

What the answer does not give

The question asked for the regions where shortages were reported, state-wise and district-wise, and the remedial action taken. The answer names no region or district where a shortage was reported, and describes the general allocation process rather than action taken in any state; it says the distribution within a state is done by the State Government. It asked for the cases registered against diversion and illegal sale and the action taken on them; the answer gives only the four months from April to July 2026. In those four months the states reported 1,80,091 inspections and raids, 9,309 show cause notices, 2,951 licences cancelled or suspended, 294 FIRs (129 for black marketing, 43 for hoarding, 69 for sub-standard quality and 53 for diversion) and two arrests, both in Rajasthan. The column for convictions reads “NIL” in every row. The answer adds that the figures are “compiled as reported by states”.

Maharashtra reported the most inspections, 42,353, 23.5% of the total, and the most licences cancelled or suspended, 1,243. Karnataka issued the most show cause notices, 2,215; Bihar registered the most FIRs, 78. Of the 47,707 bags seized, 30,029, 62.9%, were seized in Chhattisgarh; the answer does not give the grade of fertilizer seized, though the column heading names it. Eleven of the 32 rows show no notice, licence action or FIR at all.

The question asked whether additional help was planned for small and marginal farmers facing higher fertilizer costs. The answer describes the urea and nutrient-based subsidy schemes, which apply to all farmers, and gives no figure for small or marginal farmers.

One row that does not fit

Delhi’s urea requirement for 2023-24 is printed as 0.00, but 0.37 lakh tonnes were made available and 0.32 were sold through DBT. In 2024-25 its requirement was 0.23. The answer does not say why the requirement for 2023-24 is zero.

Adds up

In Annexure A, eight of the 18 columns add up exactly to the printed All India row; the other ten differ by at most 0.06 lakh tonnes, within what rounding 36 rows to two decimals can produce. Annexure B adds up exactly: every column to its printed total, and in every row the three total columns to the sum of the four kinds of malpractice.

Got it right

The answer gives three full years for every State and UT, with requirement, availability and sales side by side, and prints the tests by which its own figures can be judged, which is what makes this audit possible. Urea availability was above requirement for India in every year, from 437.47 lakh tonnes against 356.08 in 2023-24 to 450.79 against 381.45 in 2025-26; the rows below requirement for urea number five in 2023-24, one in 2024-25 and one in 2025-26, none of them by more than a tenth of a lakh tonne. In 2023-24, seven rows were below requirement for DAP. Of the 20 States and UTs with a urea requirement of at least one lakh tonne, nine had more urea and more DAP available than required in each of the three years: Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttarakhand. The second answer of the same day gives the same figures, so the two agree.

Every State and UT: DAP

Every State and UT: action reported, April to July 2026

How we did this

• Sources: the Department of Fertilizers’ answers to Lok Sabha Unstarred Question 3380 and Unstarred Question 3342, both of 7 August 2026.
• The rows of both annexures were read from the answer’s Word file by a script and every row was matched against its PDF. Every column was summed against its printed total. The urea and DAP rows of Unstarred Question 3342 were matched against Unstarred Question 3380 by the same script.
• Gaps, shares and changes are our arithmetic on the answer’s figures, which are rounded to a hundredth of a lakh tonne (1,000 tonnes). Several small States and UTs show a gap of exactly that much.
• We searched the Lok Sabha’s index for later answers on urea and DAP and found none after 7 August 2026. Other audits are listed on the Data Audit page.
• Download the data: urea-dap-requirement-availability-by-state-2023-24-to-2025-26.csv and fertilizer-enforcement-by-state-2026-04-to-07.csv. Our method and labels are on the Data Audit method page.

Questions

Corrections

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