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Government to take the organic route
The government will accord priority to organic food in the preparation of prasadams in temples, said Minister for Endowments P Manikyala Rao.
Tirupati: The government will accord priority to organic food in the preparation of prasadams in temples, said Minister for Endowments P Manikyala Rao. Speaking at the launch of an awareness campaign `Gow Adharitha Prakithi Vyvasaya Chaitanya Yatra (GAPVCY)’ here on Sunday, he said that as it’s not practicable to make organic products mandatory for the temples in the prasadam preparation, the government instead would give priority to purchase organic products to promote natural farming in the State.
He wanted the NGOs, farmers associations and individuals to take up the supply of organic farming products required for the temples to avoid them going in for products produced by using fertilisers and pesticides. Responding to a four-demand memorandum submitted to him by the Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS), which is organising the GAPVCY, the Minister spoke strongly in favour of promoting natural farming for a healthy society.
The Minister was candid enough when he said that it is not possible to ensure remunerative price to the farmers’ produce, but we can reduce the cost of agriculture through various means, including the cow-based cultivation to make farming viable. The Minister said that the government would set up district-level modern Gow-Shalas’ in all the districts to provide shelter to the unproductive and aged cows to prevent the distress sale of them for slaughter houses.
The Minister said that the TTD run Gow-Shala in Tirupati will be utilsied for conducting training programme for farmers on cow-based natural farming. TTD trust board member said that, he along with Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu, had submitted Rs 125 crore project to the Union Agriculture Minister for improvement and conservation of indigenous breeds like Ongole and Punganur cattle in the TTD’s SV Foundation for Indigenous Cattle (SVIC) at Palamaner in Chittoor district.
He said that the Agriculture Minister assured to consider the proposal which he said would give a fillip to the efforts to improve indigenous cattle. BKS national secretary J Kumaraswamy said that a 10-day awareness campaign, which would cover all the districts, would culminate in a massive meeting at Kavithi in Ichapuram mandal.
The campaign was mainly intended to promote cow- based natural farming, he said and added that the BKS sought the Minister in the memorandum to make it mandatory for the farmers, who are cultivating temple lands, to take up only organic farming and the temples to use only organic products.
Devalaya Darsini: The Endowment Minister said that the government has decided to introduce `Devalaya Darsini ‘, a novel initiative, to facilitate 1.30 lakh people have a darshan in famous temples located in various places in the State.
Accordingly, the five day and five night tour of temples would be organised from various regions in the State for providing the rare opportunity of visiting more number of temples by those who could not afford them. This would also help in promoting the temples, he opined.
