Rise in Covid cases in Bihar worries cane growers in Jalandhar district

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, July 25

The steep increase in Covid-19 cases in Bihar is making sugarcane growers here worried as the crop sowing is heavily dependent on migrant labourers.

Farmers said the alternatives to migrants such as local labourers and direct seeding technique that helped them sow paddy were not useful in the case of sugarcane.

Farmers adopted every means to sow and then transplant the paddy. They took help from local labourers, too, but this will not be useful in the case of sugarcane. The whole process is dependent on migrant labourers — Manjit Rai, President, Bharatiya Kisan Union (Doaba)

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Manjit Rai, president, Bharatiya Kisan Union (Doaba), said: “Farmers adopted every means to sow and then transplant the paddy. They took help from local labourers, too, but this will not be useful in the case of sugarcane.”

“The whole process is dependent on migrant labourers and the local labour cannot carry out the process,” he said, adding that with the rise in Covid cases in Bihar, rumours were rife that a complete lockdown would be imposed in the state.

Davinder Singh from Nawanshahr said it would be difficult for farm labourers from Bihar to come back as there would be no mode of travel available. “We have already been grappling with several problems. The rise in Covid cases in Bihar has increased our problems,” he said.

The farmer said he was in touch with his labourers in Bihar. “The situation has become serious in Bihar. My workers there told me that they couldn’t come back if the situation doesn’t improve,” he said.

Sukhwant Singh, a farmer from Nakodar, said it seemed that farmers would not get rid of the problem of labour shortage. “The sowing season of sugarcane is here and we are short of labourers. We have no idea how we will manage,” he said.