Hailstorm, rain damage apple, pea crop in Shimla

SHIMLA:

Hailstorm

and heavy rains have wreaked havoc in some parts of Shimla district by causing extensive damage to apple and tomato plants. In the fresh spell of hailstorm at Mandhol panchayat of Jubbal tehsil on Sunday, farmers have suffered extensive damage. Earlier, residents of Narkanda had suffered massive damage because of hailstorm as their crop of peas, apple, cherry, plum and apricot was damaged and loss was assessed by farmers in several crores.


Residents of Mandhol panchayat said hailstorm continued for around 20 to 25 minutes on Sunday afternoon in which apple and other cash crops suffered extensive damage. Jai Prakash Dharta, a local resident of Mandhol panchayat, said flowers and leaves of apple trees were damaged, along with

pea crop

, and it was difficult for farmers to recover these losses. “We will not even recover the input cost, including those of fertilisers,” he said.

Agya Ram Chauhan, another resident said survival had become difficult for farmers as both main cash crop of apple and pea had been damaged. He said around one lakh apple boxes used to be produced in the area earlier but this time all hopes had been dashed.

On Sunday, Nerwa area of Shimla district also witnessed heavy rains and hailstorm in which apple and tomato crop suffered damages. On the issue of damage caused by hailstorm in Narkanda area, CPM MLA from Theog Rakesh Singha had recently written a letter to state chief secretary B K Aggarwal, seeking compensation for affected farmers.

Singha in the letter said recently many areas received heavy hailstorm due to which apple, vegetables and others cash crops were damaged. He said Narkanda area too had witnessed massive damage and losses were estimated to be around Rs 7 crore. He said due to elections, the process of assessing the losses too has not been started by the administration.