Rain damaged only 10-15% crop in Haryana, says CM Khattar
The CM said damage to wheat crop was between 10-20% and not as high as was earlier anticipated.
Haryana chief minister (CM) Manohar Lal Khattar on Wednesday said about 10-15% crop appears to have been affected by the recent rains and the extent of damage to the ready-to-harvest crop was not as huge as it was appearing earlier.
Addressing a press conference, the chief minister said out of 17 lakh acre where the crop was reported to have been damaged, girdawari (field inspection) on 15 lakh acre has been completed. He said farmers will be paid compensation in May.
The CM said so far, 41 lakh metric tonne (MT) wheat has arrived in various mandis of the state, out of which 32 lakh MT tonne has been procured. Apart from this, 2.12 lakh MT mustard has also been procured and farmers are being paid on time, Khattar added.
He said damage to wheat crop was between 10-20% and not as high as was earlier anticipated.
Scattered showers in state
Meanwhile, scattered showers accompanied by high-velocity winds reported in the parts of state on Wednesday affected the harvesting and wheat procurement operations in most of the northern parts of the state.
As per reports, harvesting operations were halted for the day as machines could not harvest wet straws of wheat.
“We had to stop harvesting in the afternoon as the combine harvester could harvest only 10-acre against 30- acre we harvest daily,” said Jai Ram, the owner of combine harvesters from Radaur of Yamunanagar.
Darshan Lal, a farmer from Ladwa of Kurukshetra district, said, “Yes, the rain has affected harvesting operations. Now we have to wait for a day or two to resume harvesting.”
On the other hand, ahrtiyas were also facing difficulties to protect the procured wheat from rain as they had to depute labourers to cover the wheat lying in the open.
“We had to face problems due to showers on Wednesday evening as due to slow lifting our 6,600 bags of procured wheat were in open and we are struggling to protect it from rain as the ahrtiyas are responsible for the safety of grains until it reaches the government godowns,” said a commission agent Sohan Singh of Ladwa grain market.
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