Sowing to start from July in Krishna district

Vijayawada: The water release for the Krishna Delta is useful for immediate needs of seed beds and speeding up of farming activity. Nearly 10 tmc feet of water is required for seed beds in the next 30 days. Similarly, water is needed for paddy cultivation from next month onwards.

Paddy is cultivated in seven lakh acres in Krishna district alone under the eastern delta while five lakh acres is cultivated in Guntur district. Totally, paddy is cultivated in 14 lakh acres in the Krishna delta under the purview of Krishna, Guntur, West Godavari and Guntur districts.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu released water for the Krishna delta three days ago. Actually, the government wanted to release water from June first week. Now the farming community is busy with seedbed works.

The kharif farming activities began in several mandals in East Krishna especially in the mandals like Kankipadu, Penamaluru, Vuyuru, Gudivada, Nandiwada Pamarru and Thotlavalluru. The farmers in the mandlas are having groundwater and borewell facilities. Generally, the farmers of the mandals will start paddy sowing from July 15 every year.

Now the farmers are getting ready to use the water at first in the district. Actually, from 30 days to 45 days’ time is required for preparation of seedbeds. They already started seedbeds works from June first week. A few sections in Kankipadu and Thotlavalluru mandlas are going to cultivate ‘Srivari’ paddy cultivation system.

Already, they have good experience in yielding, said A Sri Krishna Rao, a farmer of Kolavennu village. He said that the farmers are confident about paddy cultivation as the Godavari water is assured for the Krishna delta.

Sakhamuri Mallikarjuna Rao, a native of Valluripalem village in Thotlavalluru mandal, said that the farmers used to face hardships for water release in the past due to no sufficient waters in the Krishna River. Now the situation has totally changed with the linkage of Krishna and Godavari waters, he said.