Buldhana: After scant rain, wild animals now target standing crops
In Buldhana district, delayed rain and a month and a half without showers have left kharif crops vulnerable, and wild animals raiding fields have added to farmers' losses.
The kharif season has brought little relief so far for farmers in Buldhana district. Rain played truant during the Rohini and Mrig nakshatras, and the monsoon reached the district late, delaying the kharif sowing. Rainfall looked decent at first, but it disappeared just as crops were gaining strength. With crops now at the flowering and pod stage, farmers are struggling to save them using whatever irrigation resources are available.
While farmers are trying to save their crops on one hand, herds of wild animals are attacking the standing crops in the fields on the other, adding to their troubles. Farming is the main occupation for farmers in the district, and being entirely dependent on weather, it brings good days at times and crises at others. This time the monsoon rain arrived two weeks late, sowing was delayed, and there has been no rain for the past one and a half months. On top of that, a pest infestation has also become a headache for farmers. With rain not coming, the pest infestation not easing, and as if this crisis were not enough, animals such as nilgai, deer and monkeys now roam openly in the standing crops, becoming another reason for crop destruction.
The compensation offered by the government for such losses is also very little. Ganesh Deshmukh, a farmer from Pangri Ubarhande, said angrily that a farmer toils day and night to grow a crop. On one hand the market does not offer a fair price, and on the other, wild animals cause heavy damage to the crop. He said that applying to the forest department for compensation sets off a long chain of paperwork, and even then the forest department gives very little help and brushes farmers off.
Ramdas Mujumle, a farmer from Mera Khurd, said that for the past two to three years, farming has not brought in the income it should. Whatever produce is grown does not fetch a fair price in the market, so farmers have to take loans every year just to sow their crops. Sometimes the weather is favourable, and sometimes it takes everything away. He said that even when the crop turns out well, herds of animals enter the fields and wreak havoc, causing losses. He demanded that the forest department put a stop to these wild animals entering fields.
