Poor harvest sours festivities in rural areas

Kadapa: Skyrocketing prices of essential commodities and poor crops dampened the festive spirit, as Sankranti remained a dull affair in the district. While, some celebrated Bhogi, it was only at towns, the festivities were not seen in the rural areas following bad harvest.

Farmers are yet to reap rabi crop, due to late sowing and it took out much of the sheen from the major festival of Telugus.

Normally, paddy harvest would be done by December, enabling the farmers to celebrate the festival in high spirits, but that was not the case in recent years due to lack of adequate rains in kharif and rabi seasons.

“We are in no mood to celebrate Sankranti this year, as there are no profits from cultivation. The rain God is not kind enough for us,” lamented Pamidakula Venkatasubbaiah, a farmer in Vempalle mandal.

Meanwhile the situation of labour involved in Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is far worse as they have not been paid wages from past five months.

The failure of crops had a chain effect, influencing business like textiles and the sale of garments dropped drastically.

“Garment business in Kadapa dropped to Rs 10 lakh from an average Rs 30 lakh this season,” noted Amara Subba Rao a trader. This was evident with the business coming down in Proddatur cloth market, which has about 200 shops engaged in retail and wholesale business.

This year the business was just 30 lakhs against as against 70 lakhs in the previous year, according to sources. Bayya Prasad, who runs a cloth shop in Proddatur said he had not seen such poor business in the past 20 years.