An announcement made by Telangana Agriculture Minister S Niranjan Reddy today eased the anxieties of thousands of farmers in the state about the procurement of rain-damaged paddy.
Speaking at a video conference, the minister reassured the farmers that they need not worry about the moisture content or physical appearance of their produce as the government had decided to procure the paddy that had been discoloured and damaged by the rain, and told them that orders to relax the normal parameters of procurement had already been issued to the district Collectors across the state.
He then directed the officials present at the meeting to implement the necessary Covid-19 safety measures at all the purchase centres since large numbers of people would likely gather at the centres for the purchasing process.
Further, the sarpanch of every village was asked to regularly monitor the nurseries and Prakruthi vanams in their areas of jurisdiction over the next two months, and to ensure that tankers were employed to supply water regularly to the villages.
He added that de-silting works in canals must be taken up under the NREGA at the earliest, and asked the concerned officials to identify old and dilapidated structures in villages and initiate action to restore them immediately.
The state government has been very invested in addressing issues of irrigation, and has taken many steps to improve Telangana's irrigation infrastructure. Recently, Finance Minister T Harish Rao had
released waters from the Godavari into the Kudavelly to solve the irrigation problems of the farmers of Gajwel and Dubbaka.
Besides this, the government's ambitious plan to use the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Scheme (KLIS) to irrigate one crore acres of land in the state came another step closer to fruition when Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao
released KLIS waters into Haldi Vagu at Avusulapalli and into the Gajwel Canal at Pamulaparthy village, in Siddipet, earlier this month. It is hoped that the development will push up the arable area in both Medak and Siddipet.