Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Tuesday, in a letter to the Union Agriculture Minister, urged him to send a fact-finding team to take stock of the massive crop loss due to pest attack and drought in several parts of Odisha.
In the letter to Radha Mohan Singh, Pradhan stated that crops in 1.8 lakh hectares of land in nine districts of the State have been damaged by pest attack.
A large number of farmers in the affected districts are in distress while some of them have torched their standing crops and a few have also ended their lives in distress.
Though the onus is on the Odisha Government to protect against pests and prevention of plant disease is a State subject under 7th schedule of the Constitution, the Government’s lackadaisical response to the situation has aggravated the situation.
Pradhan stated that the situation has spiraled out of control due to delay on part of State Government in supply of subsidised pesticides to the farmers.
“The Government has also done too little and too late and by the time pesticides were used, the pests had already infested the crops and destroyed them resulting in the crisis,” Pradhan stated.