Rains rekindle farmers' hope for a better yield in Chamarajanagar

The depression in Bay of Bengal has brought cheers among the farmers of the region, who are involved in brisk agricultural activities, making good use of the rainfall.

All the four taluks in Chamarajanagar district have been receiving average rains since 10 days, motivating the farmers to take up sowing. Now, with continuous rains, the farmers are hoping to reap good yield.

The Agriculture department had set a target of 29,000 hectares for sowing. However, sowing is already complete on 15,500 hectares with groundnuts sown extensively.

According to the department officials, even if there are no rains later, it would not affect the crop. Most of the farmers, who had faced crop loss during pre-monsoon and monsoon have grown horse gram, which is ready for harvesting.

Loss
Due to insufficient rains during the monsoon season, sunflower, cotton, groundnuts, jowar, maize and other crops grown on 31,813 hectares had withered, incurring huge losses to farmers. Gundlupet and Chamarajanagar taluks were the worst affected.

According to the Agriculture department, the crop loss was Rs 25 crore. The Revenue and Agriculture departments have submitted a report to the State government in this regard.
The Centre has released funds to tackle drought in Karnataka, which is yet to be disbursed to the districts.

The farmers have urged the government to assess the drought situation in a scientific manner before disbursing the funds to the districts.

M Thirumallesh, Joint Director for Agriculture, said, “Post-monsoon rains have come as a blessing for the farmers, who have grown groundnuts, horse gram and other crops. If rains continue, the district will achieve the target set for the sowing.”