BHUBANESWAR: Union Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram on Sunday lambasted the State Government for denying compensation to farmers who set their pest hit paddy crops on fire.
“Agriculture Minister Damodar Rout’s assertion that compensation will not be paid to farmers who burnt their standing paddy crops is deplorable and unfortunate. Farmers who are in utter distress due to crop loss will not tolerate such insensitive remarks and excuse this Government,” Oram told reporters.
Oram’s remarks came a day after his party demanded dismissal of Rout from the Council of Ministers by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for making such provocative statements.
Hitting out at the State Government for its failure to take timely action to prevent pest attack, Oram said a high level inquiry should be conducted to find out the delay in taking preventive measures and submitting reports to the authorities concerned. Accountability should be fixed and delinquent officials should be taken to task.
Claiming that paddy crops on more than 4 lakh hectares are affected by pest attack due to supply of sub-standard pesticides, the Union Minister said timely action by the State Government could have saved valuable lives of the farmers who committed suicide due to crop loss.
Action taken by the State Government so far is too insignificant and it has miserably failed to build confidence among the farmers to withstand the loss they had sustained, he said. Expressing concern over the increasing number of suicides by farmers, Oram asked the BJD Government to take some visible action to win back the confidence of the farmers.
The State BJP on Sunday announced to protest the apathy of the ruling BJD to the farmers by staging demonstration in all the 314 blocks from November 7 to 17. Announcing this, leader of the BJP legislature party KV Singhdeo said it is unfortunate that neither the Chief Minister nor the
Agriculture Minister has visited the house of Brundaban Sahu of Kaliapani village in Bargarh district even after four days of his suicide. This shows how insensitive the ruling BJD is towards the plight of farmers.
Having a separate agriculture budget for the State is of no meaning and this proved to be a futile exercise as the State Government has failed to address basic issues like providing irrigation and timely supply of agricultural inputs, including quality pesticides to the farmers, Singhdeo said.