CM surveys districts hit by scanty rainfall

The CM flew over several blocks in Jehanabad, Gaya and Aurangabad districts during the aerial survey before landing at Gaya airport, from where he returned to the state capital by road.

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Friday undertook an aerial survey of districts that have received scanty rainfall this kharif season and directed officials to prepare a contingency plan for tackling an impending drought-like situation in parts of the state, officials familiar with the matter said.

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar conducts an aerial survey of Jehanabad, Gaya and Aurangabad districts on Friday. (Santosh Kumar/HT Photo)

The CM flew over several blocks in Jehanabad, Gaya and Aurangabad districts during the aerial survey before landing at Gaya airport, from where he returned to the state capital by road.

Agriculture officials said districts like Jamui, Gaya, Nawada and Aurangabad have been worst hit due to scanty rainfall and long dry spell and large parts of southern Bihar have seen poor coverage of paddy crop plantation.

“We are identifying such areas to provide farmers seeds for sowing alternative crops,” said an agriculture department official, not willing to be named.

Bihar has experienced a rainfall deficit of 42 per cent from June 1 to August 18, having received only 389.7 mm of rainfall as against normal rainfall 666.9 mm. As a result, the paddy coverage in the state has been much lower than the target, officials said.

As per latest data of the agriculture department, paddy coverage in the state during the kharif season from mid-June to date stands at 29.09 lakh hectares, as against targeted 35.12 lakh hectares. In the corresponding period last year, it was 32.15 lakh hectares. The overall coverage of sowing of foodgrains, including paddy, maize and oilseeds, stands at 33.98 lakh hectares, as against the target of 41.28 lakh hectares.

After his survey, the chief minister directed officials to ensure that farmers get uninterrupted power for 16 hours for using the pump sets to irrigate their land and save the standing crop, especially in areas where transplantation of the crop has been already done. He also asked officials to provide seeds for alternative crops to farmers to provide them some relief.

“Our biggest challenge is to save the standing crop as in areas where rains have been deficient, cracks have surfaced in the soil due to lack of moisture. We are trying to step up the irrigation facilities, especially in districts like Gaya, Nawada and Jehanabad where source of water to irrigate land in a natural way is inadequate,” said another official in the agriculture department.

The government may take a decision on declaring several blocks and a few districts as drought hit in coming weeks following which a plan to give compensation to farmers for crop losses would be rolled out, officials said.

The state government has already enhanced the amount of diesel subsidy from ₹60 to ₹75 in view of the scanty rains.

CM chopper makes emergency landing at Gaya

Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s helicopter made an emergency landing in Gaya on Friday because of bad weather conditions, a senior police officer said.

Kumar was on a scheduled aerial survey of drought-hit areas in Aurangabad, Jehanabad and Gaya districts. “While returning to Patna, the pilot of the helicopter executed an emergency landing at Gaya International airport due to bad weather conditions,” Vinay Kumar, inspector general (IG) of police, Magadh range, told reporters in Gaya. When the weather conditions did not improve, the CM took the road route to reach the state capital, he said.

“While returning to Patna, the CM’s chopper encountered cloud, as it was raining in the state capita;. We diverted it to Gaya,” said an airport official in Patna.