It's another week, another problem for the farmers here in Vidarbha.
If the past week had been full of tension about availability of fresh credit from the banks in the post-loan waiver scenario, hundreds of beleaguered peasants in the suicide-affected western Vidarbha are staring at delayed or re-sowing, with rains playing truant.
Agriculture experts say farmers are confused what to sow. “It is a gamble that would cost the farmers dear if it doesn't rain in the next two-three days,” a senior agriculture officer at the divisional office in Nagpur said. “But it will surely hit the production and income.”
While banks are yet to commence disbursement of fresh loans to farmers at many places, the scanty rainfall is threatening to dampen the little euphoria that was created in the wake of the Centre’s debt relief scheme.
Over 60 per cent of the region is facing deficit of rains, according to the regional meteorological department. State-wide, 37 of the 355 tehsils in Maharashtra haven’t received any rain in July while another 133 tehsils have received abysmal rains.
Regional Met director PK Nandankar told DNA on Wednesday that the entire Vidarbha was deficient in rainfall in July, but western Vidarbha had a scarcity — meaning less than 19 per cent of the average rainfall. For instance, Akola had 48 per cent deficient rainfall, Buldana 20, Yavatmal 64, Amravati 56, and Washim 35 per cent. “If the rainfall is below 19 per cent of the average, we consider it a scarcity,” said the Met officer.
Even Wardha district in Nagpur division has recorded less than 50 per cent of the average rainfall, according to the Met office data. Farmers who went for early sowing of soybean or cotton in June are set to suffer a loss of minimum Rs2000 per acre, according to farmers’ leader Vijay Jawandhia.
Dilip Punewar, a farmer in Waifad village of Wardha, shares his concern. “I sowed soybean this year by investing from my own savings.” But his first sowing has come a cropper and he fears he’d have to re-sow the seeds if rains don't hit his fields in two days.
Soybean seeds, unlike cotton, germinate early – in six to seven days after sowing, but they also dry up quickly if there’s no moisture in land. Like Punewar, hundreds of distraught farmers in the region are praying for rains to arrive. Reports are that several villages have begun traditional rituals and prayers for rains.
Nandankar blames the farmers for showing haste in first sowing. The IMD had forecast a big gap in rains after the arrival of monsoon. Agriculture officials in the region say the scanty rainfall have crippled sowing operations all over Vidarbha. In fact, over 60 per cent of Maharashtra is reeling under scarcity, if the state government’s decision on Wednesday is any indication. The state has seen only 30 per cent of the sowings so far, much less compared to the last year’s sowing figures.
