The farmers in the state of Madhya Pradesh have suffered an extensive damage to their crops due to unseasonal rains and hailstorm which is going on even now resulting in a crop loss of about Rs 13,000 crore. The state’s total production of Rabi crop is going to decline by 10% due to this natural calamity.
The Rabi crop got damaged in 26 lakh hectare area and the state has decided to raise the amount of relief from Rs 2,000 crore to Rs 2,600 crore. The damage is estimated on the basis of available data till March 5, and the survey of the damaged crop after that is underway. A total of 30,000 villages are affected because of rains and hailstorm causing damage to 20 lakh tonnes (LT) of wheat crop, 10 LT of gram, three LT of masoor (lentil) and 1.5 LT of other crops suffered damages. Around three-fourth of lentil (masoor) and one-third of gram crop is affected in the entire state.
In order to provide relief to the affected farmers the state government is preparing a memorandum to be submitted to the Centre. The government has also requested the Centre to send a Central team soon to assess the damage.
Besides, the state government has already announced a slew of measures for the farmers, including the ones whose more than 50% crops is damaged will be provided wheat and rice at Rs one per kg.