Rabi crop on 1.88 lakh acres damaged in Haryana

Bhartesh Singh Thakur

Chandigarh, March 16

The state government today informed the Assembly that rabi crop on 1.88 lakh acres had been damaged due to unseasonal rain or waterlogging and hailstorms this year.

In terms of area, Mahendragarh was the worst-affected where crop on 55,339 acres in 29 villages had got damaged, followed by 52,064 acres in 50 villages of Charkhi Dadri, 26,011 acres in 84 villages of Rohtak, and 24,017 acres in 12 villages of Bhiwani.

The crop damage on 7,490 acres is also reported in 44 villages of Sonepat, on 96 acres in four villages of Kaithal, on 855 acres in four villages of Rewari, on 2660 acres in 24 villages of Jind and 19,067 acres in 356 villages of Yamunanagar.

The crop on 23,376 acres was damaged up to 75 per cent or more across the state, while the crop on 71,300 acres up to 50-75 per cent.

In reply to a Calling Attention on the crop damage, Deputy CM Dushyant Chautala, who also holds the charge of Revenue and Disaster Management, said no relief was provided if the crop damage was less than 25 per cent.

He cited that while the Centre’s norms provided for Rs 5,466 per acre relief for 33 per cent and above damage subject to a ceiling of 5-acre per farmer, the state government was providing a compensation of Rs 15,000 per acre for 75 per cent or more, Rs 12,000 per acre for 50-75 per cent damage and Rs 9,000 per acre for 25-50 per cent.

So for, the damage between 25-32 per cent and for higher norms was met from the Budget.

He told the House that no damage was reported in Karnal, Nuh, Faridabad, Panchkula, Palwal, Panipat, Sirsa, Fatehabad, Gurugram, Jhajjar, and Kurukshetra.

He said as per a notification dated July 30, 2019, normal girdawari was conducted from August 5 to September 5 in case of Kharif and from February 1 to March 1 for rabi crops. But on March 2, all DCs had been told to conduct a special girdawari, if any damage was reported after the completion of the normal girdawari.

The Opposition contested the findings during the discussion. Congress MLA Mohd Ilyas said how it could be that not even one acre crop damage had been found in Nuh. Deputy Congress Legislative Party leader Aftab Ahmed said the crops had got damaged due to waterlogging in Nuh and farmers had even protested at the mini secretariat of the district on January 27.

INLD MLA Abhay Singh Chautala said the compensation amount should be hiked to Rs 50,000 per acre and Mewat shouldn’t be ignored.

Congress MLA Raghubir Singh Kadian said the girdawari was a lapse on the part of officers while MLA Kiran Choudhry said firms looted farmers in the name of crop insurance.

Dushyant Chautala replied that in the future, farmers could also upload their crop damage area for verification.

Meanwhile, CM Manohar Lal Khattar also intervened and said the farmers should be encouraged to enrol for the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojna (PMFBY). “Our limit is Rs 15,000 per acre compensation whereas under the PMFBY, it could be from Rs 18,000 per acre to Rs 35,000 per acre,” said Khattar, and added that a portal would be created so that farmers could upload crop damage information for verification for bringing more transparency in the girdawari exercise.