A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday
A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday A 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and dwindling water reserves have severely hit kharif crops across Marathwada, with farmers reporting scorched soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops during a central drought assessment team’s field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed on Friday Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar : A central drought assessment team on Friday visited farms in Marathwada, where a 35% rainfall deficit, prolonged dry spells and shrinking water reserves have left soybean, cotton, sugar cane and horticulture crops scorched and farmers struggling to contain losses. During a presentation, divisional commissioner G Shreekant said Marathwada had received only 65.35% of its average rainfall this season. “Of the region’s 496 revenue circles, 37 experienced dry spells exceeding 30 days, while 155 recorded rainless periods of 21-30 days. Though kharif sowing covered nearly 52 lakh hectares, prolonged moisture stress has severely affected crop growth and yield prospects. Reservoir storage across the region has dropped to 30.7%, while groundwater levels in Jalna, Dharashiv and Latur are 4-5 metres below the five-year average,” Shreekant highlighted in the presentation. As many as 190 villages and 157 hamlets are currently dependent on water tankers, while 603 wells have been acquired by the administration. The team also inspected a dried farm pond, several parched wells and the near-empty Galhati medium irrigation project, where 106 fishing-dependent families face livelihood uncertainty. The team also inspected the dried-up Sindphana riverbed and reviewed the water situation at Majalgaon dam, where storage has fallen to just 26% of normal levels.
Farmers reported that the prolonged dry spell since early July had devastated standing crops and depleted water sources.
Madan Rambhau Mote, a farmer from Georai taluka, said, “Repeated dry spells had damaged his crops and forced him to spend privately on tanker water after his well ran dry. The team was led by Muktanand Agrawal, joint secretary and CEO in the department of agriculture and farmers welfare. It conducted field inspections in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Jalna and Beed districts, interacting with farmers and agricultural workers while assessing crop losses, water scarcity and livelihood impacts. The drinking water situation is also worsening. Officials warned that strict water conservation measures would be essential to meet drinking water requirements till Aug next year. In Sambhajinagar district, the team inspected soybean fields belonging to farmer Vikas Devidas Shinde at Demani village and interacted with cultivators about crop losses and rising cultivation costs. In Jalna, accompanied by collector Ashima Mittal, officials visited drought-hit soybean, cotton, ginger and sweet lime farms across Badnapur and Ambad talukas. The delegation later visited Beed district, where it assessed damaged cotton, soybean, tur and sugarcane crops in Georai and Beed talukas. The officials additionally interacted with women agricultural labourers to understand how crop failure was affecting rural employment and household incomes.
The delegation is scheduled to visit Dharashiv on Saturday.
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“The delegation will physically verify the information submitted by Maharashtra govt before preparing an objective assessment report for Centre,” Agrawal said. The delegation included Sunil Kumar Dubey, deputy director of the Mahalanobis National Crop Forecast Centre, NITI Aayog adviser Dr Jaspal Singh and livestock officer Dr Sakshi Bhadoria. State agriculture secretary Parimal Singh accompanied the team. Download the TOI App.