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| Drought-hit Bengal faces famine |
| Namrata Acharya / Bankura (West Bengal) Aug 25, 2010, 01:43 IST |
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If poverty and despair needs depiction, Bengal has a perfect scene to offer, as drought has taken into fold 11 out of 18 districts in the state.
The state, one of the country’s largest rice producers, has received 30 per cent less rainfall so far, which has turned the otherwise lush landscape into parched patches, of withering crops.
Nothing much has changed in the life of 70-year old Ramakrishna Barui of Ghoramuli village in the interiors of Bankura, one of the worst drought-affected districts in the state.
Barui had survived the Bengal famine of 1943 that killed over three million people of starvation. He claims that he remembers the calamity and foresees a similar situation in the days to come.
“I have not witnessed such a drought in the last 60 years, when large swathes of farms have turned into barren fields. Survival is difficult,” he says.
Agriculture accounts for almost 70 per cent of the district’s income and about 80 per cent of the farmers have small and marginal income. Paddy is the main crop in the area, but this year not even five per cent of cultivation has taken place, leaving farmers in a lurch.
Currency is yet to gain due importance in villages like Ghoramuli, as a majority of marginal farmers in rural West Bengal still survive in a barter economy as sharecroppers or Bargadars, who get paddy in lieu of their services to the landowners.
A majority of the farmers in the rice belt of the state cultivate paddy for their own consumption, with the only savings being the produce from last year’s cultivation.
“We have sold our entire paddy and don’t know what we will eat after two months,” says Nepal Seat of Inpur village in the district.
Recently, the state government had announced a Rs 50-crore aid for farmers in the drought-hit districts, to be used for free seeds, tubewells and a subsidy for running diesel pump sets to irrigate land.
Yet, for farmers the help means little, as none of the measures entail direct monetary benefit.
“We have been hearing that the government has announced Rs 50 crore for us. Even if we get 50 paise, we will be blessed,” quips Dukhuram Barui of Ghoramuli.
Also, the aid seems to be too little and too late. As a rule, Aman, or the summer paddy, takes about 145 days to mature, with rains mandatory after 30 days of preparing the dry seed bed.
This year, more than 70 days have passed so far, with no rains. Even if rain occurs now, the yield would be less than half the average, according to Anirban Mondal, assistant director (agriculture) of the Chhatna block in Bankura.
In addition, rice blast, a disease occurring in paddy, has infected seeds that have been transplanted due to a less-than-normal humidity and high temperature.
Ranjan Barai, an agricultural labourer in Kudia village, could earn Rs 50 a day till about three months ago but now his daily income has drastically come down to Rs 15 a day as he has taken up stone cutting to eke a living.
After a day of rigorous labour in sultry heat, Barai manages just Rs 5 for a basket of stones.
The farmers who own land are now left with no option but to sell it, though prices are just enough to pay off the debt they have taken from banks or local moneylenders.
“We have no option but sell our land, but the problem is we won’t get any price for it,” says Balaram Pal of Khirsol village.
Udyaditya Banerjee of the Bangiya Grameen Bikas Bank at Chhatna block in Bankura says that the demand for short-term loan is not even one-third of the average this year, as last year’s repayment is also due.
The state government has said it would convert short-term loans of farmers into long-term loans as a relief measure.
“What is the use of this measure? We don’t have the capacity to pay Rs 1,000 per year,” says Ranajit Mala, who had taken loan worth Rs 5,000 from a co-operative bank this kharif season.
No MNREGA work, no BPL cards
At a time when farmers in West Bengal are in dire need of employment, work under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) has come to a halt in the state.
To make matters worse, most farmers have not received payments under the Act for the last two months.
Swapan Badui at Badua village in Bankura district has not received any payment under NREGA so far, though the wells dug by his group have dried up due to the prevailing drought.
“The government is saying there is no money to spend more. No one is bothered how we survive,” says Badui.
State Panchayat and Rural Development Minister Anisur Rahaman confirmed NREGA work had been stopped at most places in the state and schemes like the Prime Minister’s Grameen Sadak Yojana were hardly being implemented, as the central government had stopped releasing any further grant.
“There is a problem with funds under the NREGA, which might be due to political problems. This year, no fund has been released by the central government so far under the scheme. This is probably due to political reasons, as the Union minister is from the Opposition party,” said Rahaman.
The state government says that about Rs 1,000 crore has been due this year, and it needs Rs 300 crore per month to keep the scheme going.
Under NREGA, a household is entitled to 100 days of work in a financial year and the minumum wages should not be less than Rs 60 per day. Interestingly, the Act provides a scheme for drought management, which elaborates early warning systems and remedies on it.
The issuance of Below Poverty Line (BPL) cards has also sparked widespread agitation amid drought.
The card facility allows each BPL family to purchase rice at Rs 2 per kg.
Dukhiram Ranjan, a BPL card applicant at Chattra, was denied a BPL card as he stands in front of his mud house, taking no pride in being an above poverty line resident.
According to the government’s definition of BPL, only the really poor earning their livelihood on daily basis like porters, collies and blacksmith are identified and issued the ration cards. Families having total family income below Rs 10,000 per annum have been identified under this category.
Caught between political brawl and furies of nature, for farmers in Bengal, the images of the great famine of the 1940's has deposed the memoirs of land reforms of the 1970’s, something that kept the Left Front government going for the last 34 years.
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