The State government has decided to mount pressure on the Central government to address its demands for announcing remunerative minimum support price for agricultural produce and linking of agricultural activities with the rural employment guarantee scheme.
The government has decided to make a strong pitch for bringing in changes in the existing crop insurance scheme as “it is full of lacunae and no farmer is happy with the present norms”. Municipal Administration Minister K.T. Rama Rao said the government has decided to intensify the struggle to get its demands fulfilled after successfully putting in place other inputs required by the farmers.
The government has ensured availability of water through irrigation projects, uninterrupted power supply to the farm sector, timely supply of seeds and fertilisers and investment support to farmers through Rythu Bandhu scheme. “Several State governments are under pressure to adopt the Telangana model of agriculture. The State has registered significant increase in productivity due to the proactive measures initiated by Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao,” the Minister said during an informal chat with reporters here on Friday.
Godown space
The Rythu Bandhu scheme in particular was an extraordinary step initiated by the government to help farmers and was a standing example of the effective implementation of the direct benefit transfer to genuine beneficiaries. Steps have been taken to increase godown space to 23 lakh tonnes, while farmers’ coordination committees have been put in place for taking up market intervention activities as and when necessary.
“These are in addition to the food processing policy, the draft of which is ready now. The policy aims at setting up food processing cluster in each district and it will be implemented after the Cabinet gives its nod,” he said.
Replying to queries, he said there was no truth in the Opposition’s propaganda through social media that rich farmers were being doled out benefits. There were only 295 households that had landholdings of more than 50 acres as could be seen from the records and the amount incurred on these holdings through Rythu Bandhu was as low as ₹7.13 crore.
“We have decided to provide incentives to financially-sound farmers too to avoid criticism that a section has been left out from the benefits,” he said.
The government has initiated a host of measures in the interest of all sections of the society, including the two bedroom housing scheme, while efforts were being made to attract large investments in the industrial sector to promote employment. The comprehensive plans of the government covering all the sections could be seen from various programmes initiated towards green revolution (agriculture sector), blue revolution (irrigation projects), pink revolution (agriculture-allied sectors) and white revolution (dairy development activities).
