Excelsior Correspondent
VIJAYPUR, Dec 25: Seeking early announcement of compensation to the border area farmers for massive losses caused to crops due to untimely rains, JKNPP Chairman and former Minister, Harshdev Singh regretted that despite huge devastation of paddy as well as the agricultural fields, the Government had failed to announce any relief package.
Addressing public meetings in Awtal and Nanga Panchayats of Ramgarh Tehsil after touring several border villages of Vijaypur constituency today alongwith Yash Paul Kundal, Ex-Minister and Youth President of the Party, Harshdev Singh said that paddy growers had suffered unimaginable damages to their standing crops due to vagaries of weather which needed immediate attention of the Government. Even where harvesting had been done, massive water logging had buried the produce with the farmers left high and dry, he added.
The JKNPP chief regretted that non extension of ‘PM Fasal Bima Yojana’ by the Union Territory Government had further added to the woes of the affected farmers reeling under distress. He further deplored the highly indifferent and apathetic approach of the administration who had failed to pay even a visit to the affected areas to take stock of the situation and to assess the losses sustained by farmers.
Harshdev alleged disregard of Jammu’s farmers vis-à-vis the Kashmir orchardists, saying that only in the recent past an order was issued by the Government fixing the Minimum Support Prime (MSP) for Kashmiri apples by introducing Market Invention Scheme (MIS) without effecting any corresponding increase in the support prices of any of the crops produced by Jammu region farmers.
The Jammu farmers however, he added, particularly the Basmati growers who had been seeking identical relief for damages and fixation of adequate MSP for their produce continued to be ignored and disregarded. “Further Border tensions and frequent Pak shelling has aggravated their woes with a hapless and apathetic Government least bothered about the concerns of these nationalist people,” he said.
Yash Paul Kundal said that the Government needed to realize that if Kashmir orchardists/ farmers are in trouble due to prevailing crisis, the farmers of the border belt of Jammu region were also in distress due to hostile weather and untimely rains besides Pak misadventures carried out by the rogue nation on regular basis.
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