Fresh unseasonal rain bring joy and pain to Delta paddy farmers

TIRUCHY: The Delta region on Tuesday again experienced unseasonal steady rain leaving one section of farmers who were safeguarding their harvested crops worried and another group, which was demanding water to irrigate their parched land, joyful.

Notably, the IMD has predicted that the showers would continue till Wednesday. The Delta region has been witnessing dry weather for the past few days and the farmers, who had already completed the harvesting process, had transported their crops to the DPCs.

However, on Tuesday morning, as per the forecast of the IMD, many areas in Nagapattinam, Mayiladuthurai and Tiruvarur experienced steady rains. Since the rain lashed from the morning, farmers, who had kept their bags of paddy in front of the DPCs at Valivalam, Tirukkuvalai, Valakkarai and Easanur had a tough time in saving the harvested lot. The DPC staff on their part covered the procured paddy with tarpaulin sheets kept ready at their respective facilities.

“We have already lost the harvest in the unseasonal rains at the beginning of February. While, we were limping to normalcy and completed the harvest fighting all odds, another unseasonal spell on Tuesday posed a fresh threat. Fortunately, there was no heavy downpour and so we managed to initiate safety measures to protect the harvested paddy kept in front of the DPCs,” said Masilamani, a farmer from Nagapattinam.

He said that out of the total 172 DPCs across Nagapattinam, 75 were open facilities and the farmers led to fight against the sun as well as rain to protect the crops. The permanent DPCs with proper roofing would only be the ideal solution for the farmers’ problems.

On the contrary, a section of farmers, who has been demanding to release water from Mettur dam at least twice till June 12 to rescue the standing crops from withering due to sunny weather, expressed happiness over the sudden downpour. They said, despite there being moderate rains, it would give a sort of solace to them as the parched land would get moist.

Meanwhile, the IMD on Tuesday predicted widespread rains in districts like Thanjavur, Tiruvarur, Nagapattinam, Mayiladuthurai, Pudukkottai, Tiruchy, Perambalur, Ariyalur and Cuddalore on Wednesday (March 1) as well as on Saturday (March 4).