Paddy farmers across Odisha have suffered crop loss following widespread untimely rain over the past two days. While paddy fields could not be harvested due to rainwater entering the farms, thousands of quintals of paddy was exposed to rain in absence of proper protection measures in agricultural market yards.
Bhubaneswar Meteorological Centre said 20 of 30 districts received rainfall during 24 hours, ending at 8 a.m. on Saturday. While Balasore received 18 mm of rainfall, Talcher and Angul recorded 15 mm and 11 mm of rainfall, respectively.
Damp crop
“Crop cutting was hit as harvesting machines could not be used due to swampy agricultural fields. In most places, paddy plants were found bending down,” said Prakash Rout, a farmer in Jagatsinghpur.
In several western Odisha districts, lack of adequate protective cover added to the damage. Even though the Special Relief Commissioner had warned farmers about untimely rain, suitable arrangements were not made to save the harvested crop. Paddy stocks have been dampened at market yards resulting in diminish ing of their market value.
“We will conduct detailed survey of crop damage due to untimely rain. After receive damage assessment report, we will be in a position to spell out strategy for compensating farmers,” said Sudam Marndi, Revenue and Disaster Management Minister.
Meanwhile, the meteorological department has predicted that there could be light to moderate rain in Malkangiri, Koraput, Jagatsinghpur , Sundargarh, Keonjhar, Jajpur, Bhadrak and Mayurbhanj on Sunday.
