ANANTAPUR: For the people of Anantapur district, where drought occurs frequently, the current agriculture year has been peculiar so far. While they suffer all sorts of problems, particularly crop failure every year due to poor rainfall, it has been the other way this year.

Low yield

Heavy rain during the last 15 days damaged groundnut, the main crop cultivated in the district. The crop was cultivated in 8.56 lakh hectares this year. Till a fortnight back, farmers were ruing only about the possible low yield, but the recent rain has dashed their hopes as the crop suffered major damage.

"In spite of poor pod formation we have been expecting at least 50 per cent of normal yield. But, the rain has damaged even the grown up pods and the hay may not be useful even as fodder," Chinna Narasimhulu, a farmer of Patnam village in Kadiri rural mandal said.

The Agriculture Department is already on the job of assessing the extent of damage. It is being feared that the damage could be as high as 50 to 75 per cent in most of the areas.

The district has also witnessed unusual incidents like water entering housing colonies and main streets several times in Kalyanadurg, Kadiri, Guntakal, Rayadurg, Hindupur, Dharmavaram and Anantapur towns during the current rainy season so far.

Some relief

However, the rains have improved the groundwater table considerably with about 60 per cent minor irrigation (out of 306) and panchayat raj tanks (out of 866) getting filled with rainwater. Medium irrigation projects like Bhairavani Thippa, Maddileru and Chennarayaniswamy Gudi are also overflowing.

District Revenue Officer M. Sudarshan Reddy stated that 2,725 houses were damaged in the rain in October including 839 completely. It is being estimated that another 1,000 houses could have been damaged during the last three days.

In all, 10 persons were killed in the incidents related to rain in the district this season.

Meanwhile, the flood water was still flowing through two localities in Kadiri on Thursday as the Vittalarayani Cheruvu was getting inflows from the catchment area.

Against a normal rainfall of 552 mm for the year (June-May), the district has already recorded 643.5 mm rain this year since June.

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