legislators of the ruling BJP and its alliance partners on Tuesday, unanimously urged Chief Minister Raghubar Das to declare Jharkhand as drought-affected. The demand was raised at the Chief Minister’s official residence during a meeting of NDA legislators called by him to review the important issues in the State.
“Everyone present during the meeting unanimously demanded that the State should be declared as drought-affected,” said BJP MlA from Chhatarpur Radha Krishna Kishore. All the MlAs were of the view that the condition of paddy crops across Jharkhand was such that the government should look into the matter seriously and take positive steps towards officially declaring the State as drought-hit, he said.
It was also discussed during the meeting that to make the State happy and prosperous, the focus of the Government during the next financial year should be on conserving water.
“looking at acute crisis of drinking water in the state, primary concern of the people as well as the state government should be on conservation of water. It is due to shortage of water that Jharkhand is lagging behind the other states in the field of agriculture,” added the MlA.
To deal with the situation, MlAs opined that the primary focus of the coming financial year should be on agriculture, irrigation and electricity so that the State could be made prosperous.
Kishore further added that the State Government, taking a positive step, has also decided to start working on the next financial year’s budget, so that the fund received from the Centre for their execution does not get returned.
Referring to the situation of Palamu and Garhwa, Kishore said that the condition is a bit different from other districts where the farmers, due to good rainfall in the initial days of monsoon, even took loans for sowing purposes which also got wasted due to poor rainfall. “Hence we have demanded an Agriculture College in Palamu division,” he said.
When asked about the compensation money not paid to the farmers for the last several years, Kishore said that the government this time was serious on the issue and the farmers in the state will get their dues very soon.
Another burning issue taken up during the meeting was the up-coming panchayat elections in the State. “Considering the fact that more than several party workers are contesting panchayat elections from the same seat, most of the legislators were of the view that the party should not get into it. It was, however, decided that all efforts will be made after the elections so that District Board Chairman becomes someone from the party,” said Bokaro MlA Biranchi Narayan.
Demands were also raised to declare Palamu as famine affected while declaring entire state as drought affected, Narayan said.
Meanwhile, the state government after getting block level reports from all districts is likely to take a final call over drought on November 6. According to Agriculture Minister Randhir Kumar Singh, the CM has called an important meeting of the Agriculture department on November 6 where a final decision over the issue will be taken following a district wise assessment of the actual loss of crop on the basis on the reports gathered from all districts in the State.