Annual agricultural production will witness huge dip, say farmers
Tasaduq Hussain
Srinagar, Aug 17: After nearly three months of drought like situation in Kashmir, the farmers are forced to use paid motors to irrigate their fields in absence of water across the region in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir.
The farmers complained about the inaction of the government for not taking adequate measures to address the sufferings of farmers during these tough times.
Talking to the news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), farmers across the Kashmir Valley echoed the similar concerns about the drought like situation and held the government responsible for not taking adequate measures to ensure the usage of different sources to water to irrigate the fields.
Aggrieved farmers said that the drought-like situation has pushed them on the back-foot that has forced all to avail water from different sources to ensure adequate cultivation of crops.
“There is no water in our paddy field and it is drought like situation here as there has been no rainfall, our almonds got dried up due to which it won’t fetch good prices this year,” Gulzar Ahmad, a farmer from Pulwama said.
Shakeel Ahmad another farmer south Kashmir said that due to unavailability of water they were unable to irrigate their orchards which has affected the quality of the fruit and other crops which need adequate water during these days. Similar views were echoed by the farmers in Ganderbal.
They said that they had used a lot of fertilizers and other materials from the beginning of the season and had used everything including money, energy and time in order to get good crop production.
“Unfortunately due to water scarcity our crops are getting damaged and production has reached to its half which will lead to huge loss of money as well. Water is essential for the crop production and water scarcity has landed us into huge losses,” farmers from Ganderbal said.
In north Kashmir farmers also raised similar concerns about the damage to their crops due to absence of water for all these months.
The farmers from Bandipora alleged that the canals coming out of the Jhelum River at Wasi Khan are inoperable at several places after the catastrophic floods of 2014.
“The department of Irrigation issued a formal tender for dredging. After cleaning the canal, the rest of the work was left unfinished and funds were withdrawn,” they alleged.
They said there is an acute shortage of water to irrigate the paddy fields. Locals alleged that the district administration and irrigation and flood control department has failed to restore the water supply.
Farmers from the frontier district Kupwara said that during the drought like situation in all these months people have started to use water mortars to irrigate the fields that has doubled the annual expenditure on cultivation—(KNO)
