Most of the farmers at the grievance redressal meeting presided over by Collector M. Ravikumar expressed dissatisfaction over the government’s announcement on providing drought relief to small farmers with not more than five acres of land and demanded the government to include all farmers without any ceiling on landholdings.
V. Krishnamurthy, a farmer from Ettayapuram, said while the former Chief Minister, O. Panneer Selvam, had announced drought relief of Rs.3,000 per acre of damaged crops and passed the government order, the present Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswamy had only announced farm input subsidy to the affected farmers, who own not more than five acres of land. While the whole of Tamil Nadu was affected by drought in the wake of monsoon failure and the entire state was announced ‘drought hit,’ such discrimination of farmers was ‘unfair’ and ‘unjust.’ The district has a total of 1.76 lakh hectares of cultivable lands and most of the lands were drought-hit. Hence, all farmers, who suffered crop loss, should be considered for drought relief, he said. The Collector replied that a report detailing farmers’ plight had been forwarded to the government for drought relief. Aggrieved over the cooperative banks effort to auction jewels pledged by farmers for crop loans, K. Perumal, farmer of Thoothukudi, said the cooperative banks were not acting to protect the interests of farmers. He also appealed to the Collector to intervene in the case permitting soft drink companies to draw water from the Tamirabarani. It was based on the assertion from government authorities that excess water was available in the river, that the High Court lifted the interim ban on drawing Tamirabarani water. A litre of Tamirabrani water was drawn by such companies at just thirty five paise. The Collector said while according top priority to drinking needs, the PWD authorities had been instructed to ensure supply of Tamirabarani water to people of Thoothukudi until May 7. K. Dickson, a farmer from Tiruvaranganeri, Sathankulam taluk said it would be a formidable task to remove seemai karuvelam plants at the village within three days while farmers were suffering drought. He suggested the district administration to remove such plants and sell it. Rajendran, farmer from Nazareth demanded all tanks be taken up for maintenance under Kudimaramathu scheme. The Collector said 1,22,491 farmers had insured their crops such as black gram, maize and coconut on 1,31,084 hectares. DRO M. Veerapan, PWD Executive Engineer, Tamirabarani Subramanian were present.