More than normal rainfall in Chhattisgarh this year may bring both good and bad news for farmers.While farmers in the drought prone regions may be happy to receive sufficient rainfall, excess rainfall in some regions could be a sign of worry for the farmers.
The Agricultural Meteorological Centre near Raipur has recorded average rainfall of 918.7 mm while during the last five days average rainfall of 191.4 mm was recorded, an official press release informed.
The Regional Meteorological Centre in Raipur has a forecast of light to medium rainfall in Chhattisgarh during the next five days. The moisture content in the air would be in the range of 88 to 97 per cent.
Going by the data of Regional Meteorological Centre, Raipur released in July this year, a total of 15 out of 27 districts in the State were having deficient rainfall and the situation in the Balrampur district had been the worst during the July month.
Regarding precipitation from June 1 to July 11, 2018, rainfall in south Chhattisgarh was recorded as better than the normal while the terrain areas such as Raigarh, Janjgir-Champa and some parts of north Chhattisgarh including Balrampur was recorded less than normal rainfall.
Districts which had received less than normal rainfall during the aforesaid period included --Balrampur 76 m.m. (75% less than normal), Raigarh 161.08 m.m. (49% lesser), Gariaband 159.06 m.m. (46% less) and Janjgir-Champa 165 m.m. (46% lesser). The districts which had received more than normal rainfall till July 11, 2018 included Bijapur 612 m.m. (78% greater), Narayanpur 488.2 m.m. (56% greater), Sukma 478.8 m.m. (53% greater) and Durg 406.4 m.m. (35% more than the normal)
Notably on August 20 this year, Union Water Resources Minister Nitin Gadkari said Chhattisgarh is among nine states where successful completion of intra-river linking projects will lead to reduction in disaster during floods.
The projects would also lead to improved irrigation facilities, employment generation in agriculture and increase in exports and decrease in migration from villages, he informed in a statement on Monday.
Notably, National Water Development Agency (NWDA) so far has received 47 proposals of intra-state links from 9 States viz. Maharashtra, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Odisha, Bihar, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Chhattisgarh.
Gadkari also suggested that it is high time to think about a proper legal mechanism to resolve inter-state and centre-state issues in IlR projects.
He added that river interlinking projects envisage that the surplus water available in Himalayan Rivers be transferred to the areas where water supply is not adequate in the Peninsular India. However, huge quantities of water from several Peninsular rivers drain unutilized into the sea, and river interlinking projects are seriously looking at transfer of this water to water deficit areas of peninsular India, he said.