Drought In South India

CM Siddaramaiah wrote on X that the state submitted the 1st Memorandum to the Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Home Affairs on September 23, 2023

Karnataka Minister for Sugar and Agriculture Marketing Shivanand Patil's statement that farmers wish for repeated droughts in the state so that their loans get waived has caused a stir, with the opposition on Monday terming it as an 'affront' to the farming community and seeking his removal from the Ministry. Coming down heavily on the Congress government over the remark, the BJP has urged Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to take his resignation. Patil had in September stoked a controversy for his statement that cases of farmer suicides started rising after the compensation amount to the kin of the deceased was hiked from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 5 lakh. Speaking at an event in Belagavi on Sunday, Patil said, "Krishna river water is free, current is also free. The Chief Minister also gave seeds and fertilizer. Farmers will only wish that there should be repeated droughts, because their loans will be waived. You should not wish that way -- even if you don't wish there will be drought once in ...

Blaming the previous BJP government for the current power crisis in Karnataka, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said due to drought this year, consumption has gone up from 10,000 MW to 16,000 MW in October. Responding to questions on load-shedding in the state, he said the farmers are using more electricity for their pump sets in the absence of adequate rains this year. Despite being in power for five years, neither former Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy nor BJP added even one megawatt of electricity. It is our government which generated more power in the state, Siddaramaiah told reporters here. Kumaraswamy ran a Congress-JD(S) coalition government for 14 months from 2018 to 2019 before it collapsed due to the disqualification of several MLAs after they crossed over to the BJP. Subsequently, the BJP came to power, and it lost to the Congress in the Assembly elections held in May this year. Due to lack of (adequate) rains this year, farmers are using more electricity for their pump sets.

The Karnataka government on Wednesday informed the 10-member inter-ministerial central team (IMCT), which is on a four-day visit to take stock of the drought situation, that this time the state is facing a "green drought", and requested that the assessment be made based on factors like crop growth and yield. The IMCT, led by the Joint Secretary of the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, today met the Cabinet Subcommittee on Disaster Management -- consisting of the state's cabinet ministers and top officials -- and followed it up by meeting Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. The team will visit drought-hit districts such as Belagavi, Vijayapura, Bagalkot, Dharwad, Gadag, Koppal, Ballari, Vijayanagar, Chikballapur, Tumakuru, Chitradurga, Davangere and Bengaluru Rural. "We have discussed the drought situation in detail with the central team and have given them the entire picture of its effect, especially on the farmers and their financial condition. We have also shared with them .

Unlike the rest of the country, which receives rain in the southwest monsoon season between June and September, the northeast monsoon is crucial for farming and water security in the south

At 38%, the level of water in reservoirs of South India the lowest among the five regions; the situation is better in East India, but not as good as last year