The Hindu : Panel seeks 100 per cent relief for drought-hit States

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 26, 2003

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Panel seeks 100 per cent relief for drought-hit States

By Gargi Parsai

New Delhi Dec. 25. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture has asked the Centre to consider providing 100 per cent drought assistance to States which are not in a position to pay 25 per cent of their share of the cash component under the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna. It has also suggested that the interest on both kharif crop loan and agricultural term loan for 2002-03 — which has been rescheduled for recovery over the next five years — be waived completely, instead of only for the first year in the drought-hit States.

Relief employment to drought-affected States is generated from the special component of the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna. This envisages provision of foodgrains as wages on the condition that the foodgrains component cannot exceed 75 per cent of the total wages, with the balance amount of 25 per cent being paid in cash. While the Centre lifts the bill for the foodgrains, the 25 per cent cash component has to be borne by the affected State. The Committee, chaired by S.S. Palanimanickam, has asked the Centre to take a "more liberal view" of this aspect of drought relief and give 100 per cent relief to poor States.

The panel was critical of the Task Force on Drought under the Deputy Prime Minister, L.K. Advani, saying that the foodgrains and funds sanctioned by it were only 11 per cent of the demand raised by the States. Besides, there was a wide gap between the request from States and the visit of the Central team to the affected areas for spot assessment. It suggested that the Central team be sent to States within 10 days of receiving the request for assistance for "quicker response."

At the same time, the Committee expressed its unhappiness that some of the State Governments, particularly Tamil Nadu, had made inordinate delays in declaring the drought affected areas in the States, resulting in late initiation of relief measures and getting relief from the Centre thereby aggravating the hardships being faced by poor farmers.

It also came down heavily on the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) for having gone wrong in its initial forecast of a normal south-west monsoon. The forecast turned out to be inaccurate as most parts of the country faced drought-like conditions. Had the IMD made somewhat accurate predictions, using a statistical model based on 16 parameters, the farmers could have acted accordingly and saved their money, seeds and labour," it said.

The drought of 2002-03 has adversely affected agriculture production which is about 19 per cent less than the previous year and this has had an impact on the overall GDP growth. Agriculture constitutes 27 per cent of the country's GDP.

According to the quick Advance Estimates of National Income, the GDP factor cost for 2002-03 will be lower at 4.4 per cent than the 5.6 per cent growth in 2001-02, reflecting the negative growth in agriculture and forestry.

The panel has recommended that drought mitigation be accorded the highest priority and that proper initiatives be taken by generating rural wage employment through programmes to contain the damage and suffering.

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