Continuous heavy monsoon rain, which lashed the Beas Valley for 12 hours on Tuesday night, has cheered the farmers of Mandi, Kulu, Bilaspur, Kangra and Hamirpur districts, who were fearing longer spell of the ongoing drought conditions of dry weather. This has revived the hope of a bumper of crop of maize and paddy.
However, a pall of gloom is visible in the faces of the farmers due to the menace of monkeys and there was great resentment against the alleged “unwarranted and unjust” ban of culling of the simians, which were rampaging and destroying the crops and attacking humans, particularly women and children. In the wake of increasing monkey-biting cases the farmers in the rural areas and common people in the town highly critical and sore over the ban on killing of monkeys. People have stopped raising even kitchen gardens now.
Farmers have stopped growing maize crops in thousands of bighas of land in Mandi, Bilaspur and Hamirpur districts as monkeys ravage it being their favourite item.