The revival of the southwest monsoon, though late, has cheered farmers in south Karnataka, especially the Mysuru-Mandya-Chamarajanagar belt as the government had earlier taken a decision not to release water into canals for the kharif season owing to paucity of rain.
The farmers were staring at the third consecutive drought in the region, when good rain since late August to early September helped salvage the agricultural sector to a certain extent.
However, farmers have been advised against cultivating water-intensive crops like paddy and sugarcane in the Mysuru-Mandya-Chamarajanagar belt. Instead, maize and ragi are being encouraged. But in certain places, like Shivamogga district, the area under paddy cultivation has increased. Owing to deficiency in rain till the third week of August, farmers in parts of Sagar, Tirthahalli, Hosangar and Sorab taluks where paddy is grown under upland rainfed method, had shown reluctance to take up cultivation. Following the revival of monsoon, the farmers in these taluks have taken up cultivation of short-term paddy varieties.
In Mysuru, paddy cultivation took a hit and though the target was to bring nearly 1.2 lakh hectares under the crop, by the end of August, there was about 30,000 hectares under cultivation and the focus shifted to short-term and semi-arid crops such as ragi and maize apart from pulses which can be cultivated under rainfed conditions.
But what has buoyed the farmers is that the rain has helped recharge the groundwater table. Kurubur Shanthakumar of the Federation of Farmers’ Association said the recent rain was too late for kharif crops but has helped recharge the groundwater table. “In Mysuru and Chamarajanagar belt, where the groundwater had plummeted below 800 ft. or had gone dry, it has been recharged. This will help farmers reap one or two crops next year and will sustain them,” he added.
Continuous showers have prompted farmers to sow short-term semi-arid crops such as ragi, jowar, maize, toor dal, onion, black gram, green gram, horse gram, cowpea, chilly, sesame, red gram, oil seeds and other pulses.
( With inputs from R. Krishna Kumar from Mysuru, Veerendra P.M. from Shivamogga, and M.T. Shiva Kumar from Mandya )
Water levels
The water level in the KRS was 103 ft against the full reservoir level (FRL) of 124.8 ft. The usable and live storage as on September 20 was 20.85 tmcft against the gross storage of 45.05 tmcft.
In Kabini, the water level was 2,283.12 ft and the live storage was 15.10 tmcft, while in the Bhadra, the water level was 2,129.27 ft against the FRL of 2,158 ft, and the live storage was 39.98 tmcft against a gross storage of 63.04 tmcft.
