Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Thursday visited the flood-affected areas of Punjab and inspected the loss.
He went to Ghonewal village in the Amritsar district, Begowal in the Kapurthala district, Dharamkot Randhawa village and Behrampur village in the Gurdaspur district, and interacted with the farmers while inspecting the crop loss, an official release issued here said.
Chouhan said the situation is very grim and the crisis is dreadful.
Due to the deluge, the crops are submerged and completely destroyed and ruined, and 1,400 villages are completely affected.
“Floodwater has inundated the fields here since August 26. The water of Ravi is still flowing into the fields. There is no soil under the feet, only silt, which has accumulated.
These crops have been completely destroyed, and there is also a crisis on the next crop. The pain and loss cannot be estimated. It’s heart-breaking to see the situation. But we will definitely bring our farmer brothers and sisters out of this problem. This is challenging, but every possible effort will be made and complete help will be provided to deliver relief,” the minister was quoted as saying in the document.
He also informed that, on the instructions of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Central government has sent two high-level teams to Punjab to assess the situation, which include officers from the Ministries of Agriculture, Rural Development, Roads, Energy, Finance, and Jal Shakti.
He said that these teams will visit the affected areas, assess the situation, and submit their report to the Government of India.
The affected people will be consulted to understand the ground situation, and a detailed report will be submitted to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he said.
The state government will also conduct its own assessment.
“I only want to say that I have come here on the instructions of the Prime Minister, and in this hour of crisis, the government is firmly standing with Punjab, with our farmer brothers and sisters of Punjab, with the people of Punjab. The government will definitely bring the farmers out of this disaster,” the minister added.