The Congress and the left parties on Wednesday alleged that the Centre has no “serious” plan in place to tackle the drought situation being faced by many States across the country.
While Congress expressed concern over the grave agrarian and drinking water crisis plaguing the country, the CPI demanded that the Centre convene an all-party meeting to discuss the problem and figure out ways to combat it.
“A grave agrarian and drinking water crisis plagues nearly 40 percent of India’s population today. Over 33 crore people in 2, 55,000 villages in 10 States of India are reeling under severe drought. If we add States of Bihar, Uttarakhand and Gujarat, which are also facing drought like conditions, India’s population affected by agrarian and water crisis is nearly 48.27 crores in 3,00,000 villages encompassing 300 districts i.e. almost 50 percent of India’s 6,38,000 villages and 688 districts,” said AICC chief spokesman Randeep Surjewala.
Congress also alleged that Modi Government even reduced the rural drinking water budget from Rs9,190 crore in 2014-15 to Rs5,000 crore in 2016-17. “Rural crisis can be gauged from the fact the agriculture growth rate is down to 0.2 per cent from 3.7 per centin 2014-15 under UPA Government. Even the spate of farmer’s suicides has increased to an average of 52 deaths per day,”Surjewala said.
The Congress demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi call a meeting of all the Chief Ministers of drought affected States and provide all assistance necessary to tide over the alarming condition.
left party has also called for immediate measures like arrangement for supply of drinking water in parched regions, drought pension of Rs3,000 per month per head to agricultural workers and free food to those affected. “We express concern that no serious plan has been chalked out by the Central Government till now to face this grave situation. We urge upon the PM to call an all-party meet to discuss the drought situation and chalk out plan,” S Sudhakar Reddy said.