Farmers fear damage to soyabean and urad crops

KOTA: Soybean and urad crops are close to ripening and excess rains could certainly affect the production

DASHRATH KUMAR , gen secy, HKU

Incessant rains have been a major cause of concern for farmers, who fear destruction of the maturing kharif crops after two days of heavy rainfall in the Hadauti region.

Farmers worry that the downpour that has inundated agricultural fields may batter the growing soyabean and urad crops.

General secretary, Hadauti Kisan Union, Dashrath Kumar said that there are reports of waterlogging of the agricultural fields from several places in the Kota division.

“Soybean and urad crops are close to ripening and excess rains could certainly affect the production,” he said.

Hadauti region has black cotton soil which after saturation, cannot absorb water, which damages the roots of the ripening soybean and urad crops, he said.

Kumar said that the agriculture department and revenue department should conduct survey and provide compensation to the farmers.

Around 64 to 125 mm rainfall has been reported in the Hadauti region over the last two days.

Ruling party MP from Kota, Om Birla, has also written to chief minister Vasundhara Raje for providing crop loss compensation to farmers whose crops have been damaged due to pest attack and excess rain.

However, agriculture department has denied any major loss to the crops.

Joint director, agriculture, Ramavatar Sharma said that there has been only 5% loss in the urad crop which was sown early but there is no damage to the late sown urad and soyabean crops.

Soybean and Urad crop would mature after September 22 so there is no major loss to such crops, he said.

According to the figures of Kharif crop cultivation, soybean is sown in around 5.50 lakh hectares, urad in 2.85 lakh hectares, maize in around 1.32 lakh hectares and rice in around 1 lakh hectares of land.