Dry spell in Haryana worries paddy growers
The extended dry spell and deficit rainfall in the past week has become a cause of worry for paddy growers of Haryana
The extended dry spell and deficit rainfall in the past week has become a cause of worry for paddy growers of Haryana.
As per the India Meteorological Department (IMD), the rainfall in state remained 5.7mm against the normal 12.8mm between June 17 and 23. The dry spell has led to extra burden on groundwater as the farmers are pumping out more groundwater to keep the crop alive in lack of rains and with the maximum day temperature being around 40°C.
In more worry to the farmers, the Meteorological Centre, Chandigarh has predicted no rain in most districts of Haryana in the next three days and scattered showers in some places on July 1.
According to the IMD report, the state has received 49.5mm rainfall since June 27. This is higher than the normal 38.9mm and last year’s 47.7mm but experts said that most of the rainfall occurred before beginning of paddy transplantation (June 15).
The last two weeks largely remained dry in most paddy growing belts of the northern districts of Haryana and farmers were largely dependent on tubewells for irrigation.
The farmers said the electricity supply of eight hours to agriculture feeders is insufficient as they are depending on tubewell water.
Delayed monsoon has affected marginal and small farmers most as they do not have tubewells installed.
“We are waiting for rain to start transplantation on our two acre land as the irrigation department did not open water in irrigation canals,” said farmer Raghubir Singh, of Karnal’s Nilokheri.
Farmer Jai Singh, of Bhootmajra village in Kurukshetra, said, “I transplanted paddy on two acre and now the crop is dying due to lack of water. The tubewell water is not sufficient to irrigate the entire crop.”
“In the lack of rain, I have decided to sow the remaining two acre using direct seeding method,” he added.
Dr ML Khichar, agrometeorologist at Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, in a statement, said monsoon winds are not able to move down towards Haryana as the monsoon turf is moving up towards the Himalayan foothills in north.
“Favourable conditions for activation of monsoon winds are likely to form only after the next five to seven days. The weather in Haryana is likely to be generally variable but dry till July 2,” he said.
However, deputy director agriculture department Karam Chand said as of now, there was no major impact of the dry spell on paddy transplantation and farmers having no irrigation source can go for DSR method.
