CHENNAI : Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami on Wednesday granted a financial assistance of Rs 5 lakh to ‘Nel’ Jayaraman, State coordinator of Save Our Rice Campaign, who is being treated for cancer at a private hospital here. Wishing him a speedy recovery, the Chief Minister, in a statement, said “In recognition of Jayaraman’s contribution to protect the traditional varieties of paddy, I have directed the Agriculture Department to extend Rs 5 lakh as assistance to him.”
Jayaraman, hailing from Kattimedu village in Tiruvarur district, had contributed a lot for protecting traditional varieties of paddy for future generation and has authored many books in this connection.
He had redeemed 174 traditional varieties of paddy including Mappillai Samba, Rajamannar, Kavuni, Milagu Samba, Gundu Kar, Salem Samba, Sigappu Kuruvikar, Kallimadaiyaan, Samba Mochanam, Vadan Samba, Pichavaari, Navara and Neelan Samba.
He also worked for popularising these varieties among farmers by hard work.
The Chief Minister recalled that since 2006, every year in May, Jayaraman had been organising Traditional Paddy Festival and distributed two kgs of seeds of these varieties free of cost to the farmers. Further, Jayaraman had inducted over 37,000 farmers into organic farming.