POOR POWER supply, non-availability of required amount of fertilisers and menace of the blue bull (neelgai) are the prime causes of low agriculture production in Kanpur city and Kanpur dehat. On the other hand, the growing soil salinity and water scarcity in the areas under Agra division were the stumbling blocks in raising the agro-production there.
These observations were made at the one-day divisional Rabi Agricultural Production meeting held at the auditorium of the Indian Institute of Pulse Research (IIPR) here on Tuesday. The meeting was organised to review agriculture progress in the Kanpur and Agra divisions.
UP Agriculture Production Commissioner (APC) Anis Ansari, who presided over the meeting, was told by the district magistrate Kanpur city, Anurag Srivastava, that due to poor power supply, the in-time sowing of the seeds could not be carried out in various villages adjacent to the city area resulting in production loss. He said though the Power Corporation was asked to ensure uninterrupted supply, it failed to do so.
However, one of the chief engineers, Rajiv Kumar, a representative of the Power Corporation, said the corporation has been giving 14-hour power supply to the rural areas for irrigation but the supply gets disrupted due to faults in the transformers. He said out of a total of 17,000 transformers in the state, at least 450 transformers get damaged every month.
Besides, the theft of transformer conductors also created problem for the corporation. He said during the past six months, at least 80 such conductors were stolen which could not be arranged immediately. He admitted that for tubewell operation, several applications were received but due to certain technical reasons the applications could not be attended to. A noted farmer, Raj Kishore, told the APC that the farmers did not get adequate quantity of fertilisers.
{{/usCountry}}Besides, the theft of transformer conductors also created problem for the corporation. He said during the past six months, at least 80 such conductors were stolen which could not be arranged immediately. He admitted that for tubewell operation, several applications were received but due to certain technical reasons the applications could not be attended to. A noted farmer, Raj Kishore, told the APC that the farmers did not get adequate quantity of fertilisers.
{{/usCountry}}The APC directed the officials that they should ensure its availability. Farmers said the blue bull menace has been the major reason behind low crop production in Kanpur. They pointed out that these animals raided the fields as they saw the small plants of cereals growing and ate them away.
They also said under the law, they were first supposed to report the matter to the police and then seek permission from the tehsildar or the SDM to kill the animal. The law also required that after killing the animal, it should be buried in a deep ditch.
The farmers expressed their inability to do so. A large number of framers did not have licensed gun to shoot the animal and those who had licensed guns did not want to get involved in administrative complications. Consequently, the menace was still continuing.