With the Public Works Department keeping the discharge from the Mettur dam at 21,000 cusecs and the rains abating in the Cauvery catchments in Karnataka, the delta farmers are worried at water availability for the entire samba paddy crop season. They want the water managers to assess the situation and plan accordingly.
On Friday evening, the level in the dam stood at 111.15 feet, with the inflow dwindling to 6,248 cusecs. If the current trend holds, 1.50 tmcft will be drained every day. After provisioning a dead storage of 30 tmcft, the present storage may last only for another 50 days, against the samba crop requirements till January.
The Tamil Nadu government took a calculated risk, opening the dam for irrigation on August 10, prompted by the heavy inflow brought on by vigorous monsoon rains in Coorg. Sections of the farmers were surprised at the decision, though many chose to remain silent. Like PWD officials and the government, they hoped for the southwest monsoon to remain active till September-end to bring enough rains to help raise samba nurseries and save the kuruvai crop standing on an estimated two lakh acres across Thanjavur, Tiruvarur and Nagapattinam districts.
Belying their hopes, the monsoon played truant and showed definite signs of withdrawal. This has brought down the flow into the Mettur dam, leaving the kuruvai crop at the mercy of groundwater. At present, the standing kuruvai crop is in various stages of growth, with harvest expected to start in another three-four weeks, lasting up to September-end.
Farmers in many areas in the delta have now raised samba nursery. They require continuous water supply to sustain the crops, ranging from 120 days for the medium-duration varieties to 160 days for long-duration varieties. As per the present indications, they need to depend solely on the Cauvery water for seeing the samba crop through.
On the other hand, farmers in the tail-end areas of Thanjavur, Tiruvarur and Nagapattinam districts have been demanding more discharge, despite the fact that several main channels are silted up.
Tardy de-siltingWorse still, farmers at the grievances day meeting held at Thanjavur on Friday alleged that the tardy de-silting in large stretches compounded the problem. “The PWD officials know the problem, and we want them to act diligently,” they said.
“The need of the hour is seamless coordination as well as absolute understanding among the delta farmers and PWD officials for professional water management to see through the samba crop. Water management was commendable during the last three years, and we expect that this year, too,” says Mannargudi S. Ranganathan, general secretary of the Cauvery Delta Farmers’ Welfare Association.
