NALGONDA/SANGAREDDY/KHAMMAM/KARIMNAGAR/WARANGAL/ADILABAD: About 30,000 quintals of paddy were damaged by the hailstorm that lashed Yadadri Bhuvanagiri district on Tuesday night. Part of the paddy brought to IKP centres by farmers in Bhuvanagiri, Bhudampochampally, Bibinagar, Yadagirigutta, Turkapally, Bommalaramaram, Alair and Valigonda mandal soaked as the rain pounded the procurement centres without respite.
A farmer from Nandanam village in Bhuvanagiri mandal O Nagaraju said that he brought his paddy to the IKP centre a week ago and it was yet to be procured when the rain lashed. There is an acute shortage in the supply of gunny bags and tarpaulin which compounded the problem as the entire paddy stock had to be kept in the open without any protection.
Farmers blamed the slow pace of procurement for the problem they are facing now. They demanded that the government procure the soaked paddy and pay compensation for the paddy that had been washed away. Meanwhile, the officials said that they had received the compensation amount payable to farmers whose crops were damaged in March. They said they were awaiting government clearance for depositing the amount in the farmers’ bank accounts. The government has deposited in the State treasury Rs 37.16 lakh payable to 323 farmers in the Nalgonda district.
In the erstwhile Medak district, the untimely rain during the last two days wrought heavy damage on paddy, mango and vegetables besides poultry farms. According to preliminary official estimates, crops have been damaged in about 70,000 acres. Extensive damage has been caused to paddy, maize, green gram, and mango crops in Khammam and Adilabad districts, leaving farmers in distress.
In Khammam, preliminary estimates by agriculture officials suggest that paddy was damaged in 8,169 acres, maize in 1,721 acres, and green gram in 28 acres. However, farmers claim that the losses are even greater. In the Bhadradri-Kothagudem district, preliminary reports indicate that paddy and maize were damaged in 500 acres, with losses expected to be higher.
District Collector VP Gowtham visited the affected areas, interacted with farmers, and instructed agriculture officials to start crop damage estimation and submit a report by the end of the month. Former MP Ponguleti Srinivasa Reddy demanded that the State government provide Rs 50,000 per acre of damaged crop and visited Medepalli village to examine the damage.
In Adilabad, unseasonal rains and hailstorms damaged crops in around 2,500 acres across eight mandals, with jowar and a few other crops affected. Agriculture officers have inspected the damage, and a report will be submitted to the government. Farmers who stored their maize and covered it with plastic covers have also suffered losses.
The hailstorm that played havoc on Tuesday night left a trail of destruction of the harvested paddy at the procurement centres in Karimnagar district. At Chankunta in Choppadandi village, standing crops on 1000 acres were damaged. They included paddy, maize, mango and chilli. A farmer Krishna Reddy in Chakunta cultivated paddy on 46 acres and chilli on four acres but the two crops have been damaged, causing a loss of Rs 15 lakh to him.
Two days ago, due to the hailstorm, the paddy crop had been flattened and farmers hoped that if sun smiled, they could salvage something out of it. But on Tuesday, there was another spell of rain, killing all hopes of making something out of the damaged crop.
In Peddapalli district, crops in many villages were similarly damaged. The officials have begun the survey of the damage. In Hanamkonda, Mahabubabad, and Jangaon districts the hailstorm left farmers high and dry. The paddy that had been taken to the procurement centre was either soaked or washed away as the rains swept across the district on Tuesday night.
In Dharmasagar mandal of Hanamkonda district, farmers are still in a shock over the way their corp had been damaged by the rain. They alleged that the officials of the civil supplies and agricultural departments had not provided tarpaulins to protect their paddy at the procurement centre.
The officials of the District Supply Office (DSO) and rice mill owners have started purchasing paddy from the farmers at the centres. They said there was a shortage of gunny bags and transport issues at the centres. Tarpaulins are being provided at every procurement centre, said one official.
7,276 farmers hit by rain in Nizamabad
The rain that lashed Nizamabad district on Tuesday caused damage to crops like paddy and mango in 10,469 acres in 160 villages in the district, according to a preliminary assessment made by the agriculture department. As many as 7,276 farmers have been hit. In the rain on Monday, crops in 3,097 acres suffered more than 33 per cent damage in the district and affected 3,018 farmers in 39 villages.