With the shadow of drought covering large parts of Bihar and Jharkhand due to scanty rainfall, their respective state governments have identified the districts suffering the most and started planning emergency steps to minimise crop loss and mitigate the farmers’ woes.
While the Nitish Kumar government in Bihar has declared 28 of the state’s total 38 districts as drought affected, in Jharkhand, governor M.O.H. Farooq’s advisory council has earmarked 12 of the state’s 24 parched districts for immediate relief measures due to a drought-like situation. In both the states, this is the second consecutive year when scanty rainfall has darkened the hopes of normal crop yields and taken underground water levels further below.
Bihar received just 392.8 mm of rain between June 1 and July 31 this year against the normal rainfall of 508.5 mm, while Jharkhand witnessed only 324 mm rainfall between April and July against a normal average of 907.8 mm, said officials in the two states.
The Bihar government’s stated target for 2010-11 was to ensure planting of paddy seedlings in 3,57,500 hectares as opposed to 2,70,000 hectares in the previous year, but only about 2.5 lakh hectares could manage to plant seedlings in the entire state. In Jharkhand, paddy coverage has been as low as 409 hectares against the government’s target of 1,692 hectares.
With the Bihar drought situation evoking deep concern from the Centre, which on Wednesday sought details of the estimated damage to cultivation, the Nitish Kumar government is planning to demand a Rs 15,000-crore central package to deal with the crisis.