Letters: Efficient use of water

With reference to Vimukt Dave’s “Water conservation: NABARD to help 100,000 villages before monsoon” (May 13), the apex refinance institution of agricultural credit and rural development is aimed to make an impact on water use efficiency through a large-scale adoption of micro-irrigation scheme. This can be seen in the spirit of Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana where Nabard has been allocated with Rs 5,000 crore micro-irrigation funds to disbursement through a back-ended credit linked subsidy scheme.

Nabard’s operationalisation plan is a bit ambitious as it wants to hold a micro-irrigation campaign in one month for 100 villages first and then expand based on farmers’ response to adoption. Instead of selecting 8,000 “volunteers” for the programme, Nabard can identify NGOs/civil society and/or community-based organisations. Also, the apex refinance agency can relax conditions for subsidies that farmers should apply a micro-irrigation system in their fields and then be eligible to subsidies.

While the national mission on micro-irrigation had flagged off in June 2010, the practice to use water efficiently through rainwater harvesting, storage and adoption of drip and sprinkler irrigation system has still been limited to a few states. The renewed scheme should not be skewed to a handful of states but benefits should spread evenly for all farmers.

Kushankur Dey Bhubaneswar

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