Madhya Pradesh has emerged as ‘grain bowl’ of the India contributing immensely to India's granary with steady and excellent growth in food grain production. President Pranab Mukherjee on Monday presented the prestigious Krishi Karman Award to Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan at a grand award ceremony at Vigyan Bhavan in New Delhi.
President Mukherjee gave away the Krishi Karman Award to Madhya Pradesh for a second consecutive term (2012-13), for achieving maximum food grain production in the country. The award carries a trophy, a citation and cash of Rs 2 crore in total food grain production category. In 2012-13, Madhya Pradesh produced 277 lakh metric tonnes of food grain to maintain its number one position in the country for the second consecutive term.
Madhya Pradesh is the only State in the country, which won this award for the second consecutive term since the award was instituted in 2010-11, sources said. The State topped in all three categories of wheat, rice and pulses production in the country. In 2011-12, the total production of food grain in the State was 230 lakh metric tonnes, while in 2012-13, it stands at 277.84 lakh metric tonnes, sources said.
Two progressive farmers, Shashi Khandelwal from Chourai in Chhindwara district and Yogendra Kaushik from Badnagar, Ujjain, were also honoured on the occasion. With this achievement, Madhya Pradesh's total contribution to the country's food grain production has reached the 11.2 per cent mark, sources said. The impressive performance of Madhya Pradesh in agriculture sector is attributable to increase in irrigation capacity, uninterrupted power supply, improved storage infrastructure, timely supply of farm inputs like seeds, fertilisers, and farmer-friendly bold decisions like zero-per cent interest on farm loans and bonus on wheat, rice, maize procurement. It is for the first time the State excelled in wheat, pulses and paddy.
Madhya Pradesh surpassed Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Haryana, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Bihar in the category of States producing over 10 million tonnes food grain. The State's performance for the award was adjudged on 7 criteria —production of grains, yield, procurement, progress of expenditure, yield increase over all India average and significant initiatives. MP did excellently well in each criteria.