Farmers, who were already under severe stress during the lockdown period, have suffered yet another blow in the form of summer rains on Monday and Tuesday.
Widespread rains lashed Polur (73.40 mm) in Tiruvannamalai district, Vellore (35.2mm) and Katpadi (28.6mm) in Vellore district, Sholingur (36mm) in Ranipet district, and Ambur (30.2mm) in Tirupattur district, crashing the farmers’ hopes of saving their vegetable crops.
V.D. Sivamurthy, a farmer from Avarampalayam, said that he had already suffered a huge loss since he could not send his horticultural produce to Chennai market owing to poor transport facilities.
He said that during the lockdown, he was not able to send the cucumber crop he harvested to the market and several loads of cucumber had to be thrown in the dumpyard. “I had invested around Rs.15 lakh for creating the farm for cultivating crops like cucumber, capsicum and I do not know how to get out of the debts. I have sought suitable compensation from the State government to help me tide over the losses to a certain extent,” he said.
With the rains taking a heavy toll on the polyhouse, he was at a huge loss. He had quit his lucrative job and taken up horticulture.
Likewise, another farmer S. Venkatesan from Kilarasampattu village has lost 2,400 banana trees planted on 2.5 acres of land. Having invested all his hard earned money, the compensation is not likely to give him any relief, he said.
