Bitter cultivators abandon cane crop

MANDYA: They don’t pray to rain gods here anymore but perform the rites of their crop, figuratively.
Farmers in Mandya district, who haven’t seen even a drop of a rain, have either abandoned the sugarcane fields or set fire to the crop. In some villages, there have been reports of dried-up grass (sugarcane belongs to the family of grasses) catching fire when hot winds blew over the fields.
As funereal clouds descend on the district and their lifeline dam — Krishnarajasagar — remains dry, the elders and present-day farmers alike said they haven’t witnessed a drought as virulent as the one broiling the state of Karnataka currently.In fact, farmers of the region have never been subjected to such harsh conditions after the Krishnarajasagar reservoir was built.
The worst hit are farmers of the KRS delta. As in the past, they raised sugarcane crop when farmers of neighbouring un-irrigated Nagamangala and Krishnarajpet taluks experienced drought.
The statement of Command Area Development Authoritychairman Srinivas — “I’ve not witnessed such a dry situation in my life� — is self-explanatory.
The drought has presented itself as a double-edged sword: Farmers will not have sugarcane crop next year as they have to replant it after the dam gets copious rain and all sugar factories in the district, including those owned by the government and co-operatives in Mandya and Pandavapur, will have to put off their boilers for at least 18 months due to lack of sugarcane. This spells losses in crores of rupees.
Besides farmers, hundreds of sugar factory workers will be rendered jobless. “Private factories have already sent home some workers and soon co-operative sector units will follow suit,’’ Rame Gowda, farmers’ leader from Srirangapatna, said, adding that farmers will have to wait for years to get their dues running into more than Rs 82 crore.
Sources in the agriculture department said sugarcane crop in 32,003 hectares is “lost completely’’. The farmers and the department are in conflict on the volume of crop loss.
Farmers may have to either replant the crop or take up some other cultivation, another source said, adding raising crop afresh means huge financial commitment. The source said the farmers may find raising the crop difficult for at least two or three years as “sugarcane bulbs’’ needed for plantation will be in short supply.