We are open to declaring a wet drought, says agri minister

Farmers get more benefits than just compensation for the loss of crops when the government declares a drought

MUMBAI: After the crop losses on 63,58,300 acres in 30 districts of the state owing to the heavy rainfall over the last four weeks, state agriculture minister Dattatrey Bharne said that the government was amenable to labelling the situation a wet drought. Farmers get more benefits than just compensation for the loss of crops when the government declares a drought—such as a waiver on electricity and crop loan payments and water taxes among other things.

We are open to declaring a wet drought, says agri minister

Opposition parties and agricultural experts have been calling for the government to announce a wet drought, and Bharne said that this was being considered receptively. “Farmers too are demanding this,” he said. “There are certain norms to declare a wet drought, and CM Devendra Fadnavis and deputy chief ministers Ajit Pawar and Eknath Shinde will definitely take a call on it.”

Barring a few districts in North Maharashtra and Vidarbha, most have recorded crop losses, with Beed, Nanded, Solapur, Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg, Nagpur and Chandrapur being the most badly hit. The state government compensates losses at ₹8,500 a hectare for rainfed crops, ₹17,000 a hectare for irrigated crops and ₹22,500 a hectare for horticulture crops. It expects the compensation amount to exceed ₹4,200 crore.

The government has already released ₹627.39 crore as compensation for crop losses, including ₹553.48 crore for the losses in Nanded alone. ₹73.91 crore was released for crop losses in nine districts owing to the downpour in the month of August. Soybean, maize, cotton, onion, sugarcane and urad and toor dals were majorly damaged in the heavy rainfall.