In the past 24 hours, farmlands and municipal wards recorded reverse scenes in Burdwan (East). When municipal wards are struggling hard to overcome inundation, the croplands are gasping for rain god’s mercy!

Despite heavy showers in the first half of July, sowing of Amonpaddy, one of the principal crops of Burdwan (East) – Bengal’s rice bowl — however, has shown snail’s progress and this, according to the senior district agriculture officials resulted due to paucity of “adequate” precipitation in the second half of the month.

A substantial part of Burdwan (South) subdivision, including the Burdwan town, meanwhile has recorded significant rainfall in the last 24 hours. In Burdwan town only, 49.9 mm precipitation was recorded. Farmlands and seedbeds in the blocks like Raina, Khandaghosh, Jamalpur in Burdwan (South) were submerged significantly leaving the farmers apprehensive about decomposing of the seedlings.

A farmer in Khandaghosh, said, “Last two day’s downpour has ruined the seedbeds of uncountable farmers like me.” The rest of the district farmlands however reflected a different scene. When the average July precipitation in Burdwan (East) is 300 mm, this year, as the officials said, the district received only 218 mm rainfall.

The precipitation had reached its peak of 337 mm in July 2020. This year, the district had though set a target to cultivate. Amon paddy on 3.80 lakh hectares, sowing could hardly reach two lakh hectares as yet.

“Seedbeds in a number of blocks couldn’t be prepared on time due to dearth of rainwater. The larger segments however could secure seedling preparation as almost 87 per cent of Amon cultivation in our district gets backup irrigation support from Damodar Valley Corporation’s canal system” said Jagannath Chatterjee, deputy director, agriculture, in Burdwan.

The DVC’s irrigation extends irrigation support to 2.35 lakh hectares, the officials said. The DVC already has unlocked the canal gates for releasing irrigation water on 26 July but still, it would take four more days to reach up to the tail-end of the minor canals, says Shampa Dhara, Sabhadhipati, Burdwan (E) Zilla Parishad.