Farmers denied due irrigation facilities

BUILDING INDIA - 3/ IRRIGATION

Bharat Nirman aims to irrigate 10 million hectares of area from 2005 to 2009. Of this, minor irrigation schemes will cover 1 million hectares. In parts of Madhya Pradesh, no one has heard of Bharat Nirman and minor irrigation, and in Chhattisgarh, a project remains on paper while the farmers suffer losses.

Vinod Kumar Yadav, a farmer in Kuteshwar village of Raipur district in Chhattisgarh, owns 20 acres of agriculture land. For many years, he has not grown anything on over seven acres. The reason? The village has no irrigation facilities and the one sanctioned under Bharat Nirman exists only on paper.

The village, 30 km from Raipur, comprises 1,000 residents and 900 acres of agriculture land. "The crop depends totally on the monsoon," Yadav said.

Most farmers in the village keep a part of their land barren due to lack of an irrigation facility. "Excess rain and other factors damage seeds and lead to crop failures," Yadav said.

This year's monsoon came as a big shock for the village. "We had finished sowing when rain on June 29 destroyed the seeds," he said. Now, the farmers are purchasing seeds on credit. Every year, the farmers lose 25-30 per cent of their crop to rains.

"Had the state government implemented the minor lift irrigation project under the Bharat Nirman programme, the heavy rains would have been a boon," said Kanshiram Gilhare, a farmer. "Hardly any water reaches the village as it is at the tail-end of the Kurud Nullah," he added.

The Kuteshwar lift irrigation project, envisaged to irrigate 202 hectares, was started two years ago.

"The civil work was complete and pumps were installed, but there was no power to run the project. We are waiting for the state electricity board to give a demand note so that the project can start," said PK Agrawal, the engineer-in-chief with the state water resources department.

The state authorities have no record of the number of projects undertaken and their status. "We are compiling the reports and will make them available in a day or two," Agrawal said.

The chief engineer of the department, under whose jurisdiction Kuteshwar village falls, is unaware of any such project under Bharat Nirman.

According to the records collected by Business Standard, the state plans to irrigate 3.87 lakh hectares under the programme at a cost of Rs 3115.39 crore.

The Centre would give Rs 576 crore under the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme (AIBP) while Rs 848 crore would come from the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development. The rest (Rs 1,740) would come from the state plan.

In November 2000, at the time of the formation of Chhattisgarh, just 13.28 lakh hectares, that is, 23 per cent of the gross sown area was irrigated. At the end of 2005-06, the figures were 16.80 lakh hectares and 29.04 per cent.