Rains damaged crops on 6.48L acres across Haryana

Geetanjali Gayatri

Chandigarh, August 25

Crops on 6.48 lakh acres have been damaged due to floods in July this year as per the claims uploaded on the e-kshatipurti portal and there may be a minor impact on the prices of paddy due to damage to paddy crop in the state.

This was stated by Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala in a reply to a question by Indian National Lok Dal MLA Abhay Chautala on the first day of the monsoon session of the Haryana Vidhan Sabha here today.

Government hiding extent of damage: INLD

• Though the reply to INLD MLA Abhay Chautala’s question lists out annexure for crop-wise and district-wise details of damage due to rains, these have not been uploaded on the website or provided to him. Chautala said the government was hiding the extent of damage
• “The incomplete answer to my question is just another attempt at hiding the facts. The Department has lied about work done on the ground. The government machinery was totally defunct. I will take this up in the House though I don’t think action will be taken,” he stated later

In his reply, the Deputy CM said 1,33,625 applications had been received on the portal till August 21 for crop damage relief. The claims in these applications would now be verified by the field officials of the Revenue Department — from the patwari to the Deputy Commissioner concerned — before disbursement of the compensation is made.

While stating that the rainfall during the month of July had affected the standing paddy crop in Haryana, the waterlogging in the paddy fields is likely to lower the yield of the paddy crop. The reply states that significant loss in the production is limited to only few blocks of the state.

In a reply to another question by Congress MLA Kuldeep Vats, the government admitted that there was water accumulation in over 30 villages due to monsoon and unseasonal rain and remedial measures had been planned and implemented by deploying electric and diesel pump sets and laying a drainage pipeline in addition to the existing infrastructure.