The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Pongalur farmers seek compensation

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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Pongalur farmers seek compensation

Staff Reporter

Untimely rain destroys a variety of crops

Photo: M. Balaji

For rights: Uzhavar Uzhaippalar Katchi activists staging a demonstration at Pongalur in Coimbatore district on Friday demanding compensation for crops damaged in the recent rain. –

TIRUPUR: Hundreds of farmers owing allegiance to the Uzhavar Uzhaippalar Katchi on Friday staged a demonstration in front of the Panchayat Union Office at Pongalur demanding compensation for the crop damaged in the unseasonal rain. The party president, K. Sellamuthu, said that onion, maize, groundnut, cotton, tomato, sunflower and paddy had been affected in the untimely rain that lashed Palladam, Pongalur and Annur last week.

Damage assessment

Government should send officials to the fields to assess the crop loss in Coimbatore district. Compensation should be disbursed at the earliest, he said.

Onion growers had been suffering huge losses for the last three years for various reasons, Mr. Sellamuthu said and demanded a compensation of Rs. 25,000 an acre.

He said the farmers incurred losses in 2006 because of substandard seeds supplied by the Government. In the subsequent year the slump in prices caused them huge loss.

Mr. Sellamuthu asked the Government to set up cold storage facility at Pongalur, as Pongalur and Sultanpet were major centres of vegetable and fruit cultivation. Coimbatore district president of the party K.C.M. Balasubramaniam and Narayanasamy Naidu Trust president E. Balasubramaniam among others spoke.

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