Ranchi: Chief Minister Hemant Soren held a high-level review meeting regarding the prevailing drought situation in the state and took detailed information from the officials about the low rainfall and sowing of crops in various districts and blocks of the state.
The Chief Minister asked the officers to prepare a detailed plan at the earliest to provide relief to the people living in rural areas along with farmers, cattle rearers and labourers from drought.
The Chief Minister categorically said that all the concerned departments should prepare a detailed action plan to deal with the drought. He directed them to make sure to give benefits to farmers and labourers by making schemes in agriculture, animal husbandry, irrigation, rural development, Mnrega and drinking water and other sectors.
In view of the drought situation, he gave instructions to the officers to start kutcha works related to soil. He asked them to start construction of kutcha road construction, pond and dobha construction, construction of bunds in the fields etc in rural areas so that farmers and labourers can be provided relief.
He told the officials that due to less rainfall in many areas of the Santhal and Palamu divisions a situation of the water crisis has arisen for agriculture, drinking water and livestock. In such a situation senior officers should visit these areas and get information about the ground reality there and prepare a report to deal with it and give it to the government so that effective steps can be taken as soon as possible, he directed.
The Chief Minister said that special attention needs to be paid to ensure that there is no migration of farmers and labourers from the state due to drought. He said that how farmers labourers and other affected people can be connected with employment what should be the arrangement to give them wages a full report should be prepared on what other options can be adopted to deal with drought and which plans can be implemented related to it.
The Chief Minister also asked the officials to take full information about the preparations being made by the drought-affected states to deal with the drought. He was informed by the officials that according to the rainfall situation in the state till August 15, 131 blocks are in the state of moderate and 112 blocks in the state of severe drought.
At the same time, so far only 37.19 percent of the crops have been sown in the entire state. In this, 30 percent of paddy has been planted, 63.81 percent of maize, 44.95 percent of pulses, 40.67 percent of oilseeds and 28.87 percent of coarse cereals. In the high-level meeting, Health and Disaster Management Minister Banna Gupta and Agriculture Minister Badal, Chief Secretary Sukhdev Singh, Additional Chief Secretary Arun Kumar Singh and other officials of the concerned department were present.