The Agriculture Department, which has an onerous task of educating farmers about cultivation of less water-intensive crops, has not yet set up its stall at the Mysuru Dasara exhibition. This, despite a standing instruction from Chief Minister Siddaramaiah that all government departments and zilla panchayats should set up their stalls on day one of the exhibition.
The department is spending several lakh rupees to set up its stall in the exhibition, through which it plans to educate farmers about scientific cultivation and crop insurance, besides instilling confidence in them. But the exhibition will come to an end in another few days and setting up of the stall now will be of little use.
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55 days late
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Different government schemes for the farming sector, loan schemes for farmers, and use of machinery in the absence of manual labour are among the many aspects that the department was expected to educate farmers about. But the stall has not been set up even after 55 days of the commencement of the exhibition.
Most of the other departments set up their stalls within the first week of October and have been enlightening people about different schemes and its achievements in the past one year.
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Officials in the Agriculture Department said that the previous Joint Director of the department was transferred just prior to the Dasara and the new officer took some time to approve the works.
This has resulted in the delay. The officials said the stall would be set up in another four days. They claimed that a crop park had already been set up in the exhibition to demonstrate the stage-wise growth of different crops.
All the seven taluks in Mysuru district were declared drought-hit and hundreds of farmers committed suicide in the last 18 months. This calls for an urgent need to educate farmers about scientific cultivation methods, besides instilling confidence in them.
The Mysuru exhibition is visited by thousands of people every day, including farmers and their families.