: Farmers who spoke at the farmers’ grievances day meeting here on Wednesday urged the district administration to suspend the implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to facilitate farming operation in rural areas.
Dinakarasamy, a progressive farmer, said that labour shortage posed a serious problem to paddy cultivators. With discharge of water from the Mettur, some effort had been taken for raising samba. But non-availability of farm labourers particularly for applying manure and clearing the weeds resulted in serious loss to farmers. So, he urged Collector S. Ganesh to suspend the implementation of the MGNRES.
G. S. Dhanapathy, district chairman, Farmers Forum of India, said that the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation should ensure uninterrupted power supply for farm pump sets. He urged the Public Works Department to evolve a comprehensive plan for dredging major tanks and maintain sluices.
The Collector assured the farmers that action would be taken immediately to redress their grievances. He said that the district administration had enough fertilizer for distribution to farmers during the samba season. About 3,796 tonnes of urea, 653 tonnes of DAP, 724 tonnes of potash and 1,257 tonnes of complex had been stocked.
