大象传媒

Shipments of non-basmati white rice will be banned to keep domestic prices down ahead of the general election expected early next year.

The biggest exporter of rice in the world is halting sales of the grain overseas with immediate effect.

It comes as worldwide grain prices have already been hit the collapse of the Black Sea Initiative and Russian threats to cargo ships.

(Picture: A shopkeeper sews at a rice wholesale market in the eastern Indian city of Kolkata May 7, 2008. Credit: REUTERS/Parth Sanyal)