ADDICTED TO SUGAR
Despite a severe drought two years ago, Latur’s farmers prefer to grow water-guzzling sugarcane. Why?
AMUSKY BAD ODOUR suffocates your senses as you reach Harangul, some 10 km from Latur. It comes from the Manjra sugar mill, an indication that sugarcane crushing is in full swing in the city. Latur is the same city which two years ago had acquired the dubious distinction of being the “parched city”. Now, it is ringed with lush fields of ‘water-guzzling’ sugarcane thanks to a spell of decent rains last year. Seven of the 11 sugar mills here are running day and night. At the same time, there are more borewells being dug than ever before.
After the drought, experts had flagged water-intensive sugarcane cultivation as a major reason for the drought. In fact, the Water and Irrigation Commission, headed by Madhav Chitale, had recommended banning it in the entire Marathwada region (of which Latur is a part) a couple of years ago. Chitale, a former chairman of the Central Water Commission, says that sugarcane is draining Marathwada’s groundwater, a precious commodity in a region with irregular rainfall. “Sugarcane now uses about 70 per cent of Marathwada’s irrigation water,” he points out. Water expert Pradeep Purandare, a former professor at the Water and Land Management Institute in Aurangabad, agrees that there is a connection between sugarcane and the drought.
In addition to the bounty of last year’s rainfall, the widening and deepening of the river Manjra, done by locals through an initiative of Sri Sri Ravishankar’s Art of Living (AOL) and the RSS at Nagzari barrage, created some additional stock of water. RSS worker Shivdas Mitkari says the ‘Jalyukta Latur’ project—to which people across the political spectrum contributed—helped increase the water level by eight metres. However, most of the water is being used for sugarcane cultivation. Farmers are already using unauthorised means to draw water from the river. india today found at least 50 lift irrigation pumps arrayed along a 100 metre stretch of the river. The barrage is significant as it supplies drinking water to Latur. Water lifting for sugarcane had led to the scarcity in 2016.
50,000 BOREWELLS IN LATUR, A TOWN WITH A POPULATION OF JUST 500,000
Author and water conservation activist Atul Deulgaonkar says unless sugarcane cultivation and the associated sinking of borewells is controlled, Latur might have to face another, worse drought in the near future. “Being a water-stressed area, there is an acute need for good water management in Latur,” he says. He alleges that the government is not serious about implementing its own policy of making waterefficient drip irrigation compulsory for sugarcane. “The government is under the wrong impression that its flagship scheme Jalyukta Shivar (farms full of water) will eradicate drought,” Deulgaonkar says. “The scheme is faulty by design and it has become contractor-driven.”
Makarand Jadhav, who heads AOL in Latur, agrees that drip irrigation is the need of the hour. But he says the farmers don’t like it “because they can’t afford the installation expense. The government reimburses 60 per cent of the expenditure, but only after the system is in place”. The average cost of installing drip irrigation on one acre is Rs 1 lakh. “Farmers have other priorities, like their children’s education. There’s no extra money for this,” he says.
The president of the West Indian Sugar Mills Association and chairman of Natural Sugar Mills, B.B. Thombare, is naturally more ‘pro-cane’. He says it’s a myth that sugarcane is a water-guzzling crop, arguing that there is no scientific study to prove this. “My experience says sugarcane on one hectare needs 15 million litres of water in a flow irrigation system. If drip irrigation is used, this comes down to 7.5 million litres. It is equal to soyabean and wheat.” He says there is a need to educate farmers on water usage. “Sugarcane could be cultivated in less water too. The crop has got a bad rep because farmers give it unneeded water,” says Thombare, who has been managing sugar mills for 42 years now.
Water activist Amol Gowande says farmers go for cane because it is a cash crop. No other crop gives profits of Rs 1
“Sugarcane cultivation now uses up about 70% of Marathwada’s irrigation water” MADHAV CHITALE Head, Water and Irrigation Commission
lakh per acre. This year, sugar mills in Latur paid farmers Rs 2,200 per tonne of sugarcane. They get Rs 2,800 per tonne for soyabean but the sugarcane yield per acre is much higher than soyabean. “If you give them an option of a guaranteed income, the farmers will move away from sugarcane,” Gowande says. Deulgaonkar agrees while drawing attention to the rampant digging of borewells in Latur. As per government records, Latur, a town with a 500,000 population, has around 50,000 borewells. Ahmedpur farmer Harishchandra Yerge has 63 borewells on his farm—57 are now dry. “I did it searching for water,” Yerge says. “But I will not advise anyone to go for borewells now.”
Local politicians have also had a hand in the proliferation of sugar mills. The area did not have a single sugar mill till 1986 when former chief minister, the late Vilasrao Deshmukh, started the Manjra Sugar Mill. Since then, 11 more have come up in the area. Deshmukh’s brother Dileep and MLA son Amit have direct control over four of them. Amit’s company has just got permission to start another one, the optimistically named 21 Century Sugar Mill. Such was the response to
THE DESHMUKHS SEE THE SUGAR MILLS AS A MEANS TO LOCK DOWN VOTES. THEY CONTROL FOUR MILLS IN LATUR
it that when registrations began last month, some 40,000 farmers filled membership forms on the first day.
The Deshmukhs apparently see the sugar mills as a tool to lock down votes. If a farmer becomes a sugar mill member, his vote is fixed since the management decides the fate of his crop. Under Amit Deshmukh, the Congress last year lost the Latur municipal corporation to the BJP for the first time in 25 years. He may find the next assembly election, slated for September 2019, a challenge. A Congress source says Amit is keen on fielding youngest brother Dheeraj from the Latur rural seat. “A fifth sugar mill under the Deshmukhs could be a decider here,” he says.