Odisha: Congress MP Bhakta Charan Das met Prime Minister over plight of farmers

Orissadiary, Aug 15, 2013
Report by Odisha Diary bureau, New Delhi: Kalahandi MP Bhakta Charan Das met Prime Minister today and apprised him of the plight of the farmers of Kalahandi and Nuapada who lost their harvested paddy due to heavy rains.  Das has urged the PM to compensate the farmers with the Minimum Support Price per quintal and also requested him to provide help from the natural calamity fund as the State Government doesn't seem to take the matter seriously which is evident from the amount it has announced as the compensation i.e. Rs. 6500/- per hectare which is not adequate. Mr Das said that farmers in Odisha had to suffer heavy losses because of excess rainfall this year. This year (till June) the total rainfall was measured to be 3436.0 mm whereas the normal amount of rainfall is only 240.4 mm. Due to such heavy rainfall around 570 Quintals of paddy got washed away. This year during Rabi, out of the total paddy area of 146890.00 acres, 21014.45 acres got affected. The paddy crops were ready, lying open in the market for sale but it took more than a month’s time to the state government for procurement of the crop. MP Das also draws attention of PM over lack of storage facility in the state. Mr. Das said because Of this all small, medium and marginal farmers had to bear heavy loss. Their entire crop has gone wasted. Things have always been bleak for these farmers and this calamity has made their lives even worse.  MP Das requested Prime Minister to  take up the issue of the loss of these poor farmers considerately and get them at least 50% compensation for their destroyed crops as per the minimum support price per acre.  MP Das has written a letter to Chief Minister in this regards.