Anantapur in clutches of drought

• Drought plagues district for third time
• Severe deficient rainfall resulted drying up of fields and wells
• Debt-ridden farmers cry for immediate help

Anantapur: Farm sector is at stake as famine -like situation continues to prevail all over the Anantapur district for past three years. Unable to get returns on the investment made on the crops, the poor farmers of the district are looking for alternate avenues. The drought is not new to the district. It has been haunting people of the district since a decade.

Approximately seven lakh farmers are into agriculture in 63 mandals. Nearly 10.5 lakh hectares were under cultivation.Groundnut used to be the major crop and cultivated in 6.5 lakh hectares. But the area of cultivation is diminishing day by day. It is evident that the area of cultivation has declined to half of it as the number of farmers reduced to 4 lakh by 2014.

The situation became worse since three years. The district was severely hit by three consecutive droughts. The government did not extend any help to the farming community, driving many farmers to shift from their profession. The government declared 63 mandals as drought-hit for the year 2014-15. Even during previous year also 63 mandals were declared drought hit. But nothing has been done to mitigate the sufferings of the farmers. The official machinery should implement drought manual.

Fodder should be supplied and agriculture loans must be waived off. Even farmers should be paid crop insurance. But nothing this sort seems to be taken place so far. It is alleged that government is wasting time on the pretext of studying the situation. Recent visit of Minister Kamineni Srinivas with BJP members to the drought-stricken Rayalaseema ended up with a mere lip service. Debt-ridden farmers are caught in a desperate situation. This is the high time for the government to take the matter seriously and extend necessary help to the vulnerable community.

BY Payyavula Praveen