The Telugu Desam Party unit of Anantapur on Friday chalked out a plan for a prolonged agitation to highlight the agrarian crisis in the district following the rain deficit for 50 days in the current kharif season.
Due to the crisis arising out of the failure of the groundnut crop in majority of the 11 lakh hectares where the crop was sown this year, 17 farmers had reportedly committed suicide in the past 45 days, said Rayalaseema Coordinator Kalava Srinivasulu and Uravakonda MLA Payyavula Keshav at a press conference after the coordination committee meeting held for two hours in the party office.
‘Field-level survey need of the hour’
“It is surprising that neither the Chief Minister nor the Agriculture Minister had spoken on the issue so far and none of the agriculture department officials visited the district to understand the crisis first-hand,” said Mr. Kalava Srinivasulu.
He said that constituency in-charge persons of the party were asked to make a field-level survey of the damaged crop and let the agriculture and revenue officials know about it.
“We will raise our voices at the district headquarters against the government for not paying ₹936 crore input subsidy for the 2018 kharif crop loss,” said Mr. Keshav Srinivasulu, adding that no effort has been made to get insurance for the crop.
The government had paid only ₹221 crore in 2020 for the loss suffered by 2.29 lakh farmers in 2019, which does not compensate even 10% of their input cost, he observed.
The party leaders said since the growing of groundnut had turned non-remunerative, the area sown had come down from 12.26 lakh acres in 2020 to 11 lakh acres this year, and even 50% of that has not been registered under the e-crop booking, which will not help the farmers when they make an insurance claim or seek compensation from the government.
