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Drought in TS: No contingency plan in place
Highlights
Though severe drought conditions prevail in all districts of Telangana, the government is learnt to have decided not to announce any contingency plan for the ongoing Kharif season. Principal Secretary to Agriculture C Parthasarathy admitted that the prolonged dry spell had resulted in depletion of ground water levels and reservoirs had touched dead storage levels.
Prolonged dry spell leads to depletion of groundwater levels; reservoirs touch dead storage levels
- Drying up of borewells badly affected farming season
- Paddy sown in only 5 lakh hectares this Kharif season as against 14 lakh hectares last year
- Farmers body plans massive dharna on September 1
Hyderabad: Though severe drought conditions prevail in all districts of Telangana, the government is learnt to have decided not to announce any contingency plan for the ongoing Kharif season. Principal Secretary to Agriculture C Parthasarathy admitted that the prolonged dry spell had resulted in depletion of ground water levels and reservoirs had touched dead storage levels.
But he indicated that there would be no contingency plan. A contingency plan is an alternative to the annual Agricultural plan to provide succour to the farmers who lost their crops in Kharif and Rabi seasons due to natural calamities like drought and cyclone affect. Under the plan farmers are provided seeds and fertilisers with 100 per cent input subsidy to take up ID (Irrigated Dry) crops in the place of rain fed crops depending on the fertility of the lands and moisture levels in soil.
The Agricultural department prepares the plan in the middle of every farming season depending on the sustainability of the crops. As per the scheduled, the government should have enforced the plan from July end to the August last week. The official said, most of the areas in all districts received scanty rainfall, under the influence of the weak South West Monsoon, which does not allow resumption of farming activity. Drying up of bore wells also badly affected the farming season.
The official statistics said that Paddy has been sown in only 5 lakh hectares of land this Kharif season as against 14 lakh hectares last year in Telangana . Farmers in Mahbubnagar district bore the brunt as their paddy crops withered to the extent of 1.05 lakh hectares due to water shortage. The other worst-hit districts were - Nizamabad, Karimnagar and Ranga Reddy.
Though the recent rains brought some respite to Khammam, Adilabad and part of Warangal districts, Parthasarathy said the moisture level in the soil was still below the normal level. The low moisture levels will affect the yield of the dryland crops. The moisture levels vary for each ID crop.
Agricultural Scientist Professor H Prasada Rao found fault with the government for halting the contingency plan without conducting field level scientific study on moisture levels in soils and water levels in the bore wells. The government should have announced the drought- hit mandals and should have implemented the plan by August second week which was the right time to resume farming activity in the kharif .
Even the moisture levels are low, some dry crops like Maize and some pulses will be sustained. Rao said in the previous years when the state faced severe drought , governments encouraged farmers to take up Rabi season early in September instead of November under the contingency plan. This helped the farmers to continue the farming activity and get relief from debt burden.
Telangana Rythu Sangham Vice President and Telangana Farmers Association member T Sagar said the present agricultural crisis will aggravate the threat of farmers suicides if the government did not come to the rescue of the farming community. In the last two months alone, 200 farmers committed suicide due to mounting debts.
He said Telangana will also face severe food crisis as the yield of Paddy and other foodgrains will be all-time low this year. Against the government’s decision not to announce contingency plan , he said all the farmers associations will hold a massive dharna on September 1 in the T state.
By:Patan Afzal Babu
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