Central team fails to visit several drought-hit areas

- Team members visit villages close to national highway
- Upland areas have been worst hit but were not covered by Central team

Nellore: The visit of the Central drought team found to be an eyewash activity as they had visited only few villages close to the national highway on Monday. District officials and farmers had huge expectations on the team as they hoped that the team would shower benefits to the farming committee. At some places, even farmers were not present where the team was planned to visit. Finally, they confined to six villages close to the NH-16 and adjacent to the places.

In fact, the State government had announced 27 mandals in the district in last October as drought-hit. But, the teams confined to visit selected villages picked by the district administration in Tada, Sullurpet, DV Satram, Ozili, Chillakur, and Gudur mandals located close to the national highway. But, there was no preference for the villages located on western part of the district where upland mandals had faced severe drought conditions due to lack of water and adequate rainfall. A three-member team headed by G Rambabu and comprising Dr HR Khanna and SE Meena as members has visited these villages and interacted with the help of team head and District Collector Mutyala Raju.

The team could cover only 4 to 5 mandals located on the southern part of the district. Farmers expressed their difficulties to the team members. Farmers also explained to team members that they were facing severe difficulty for water for both irrigation and drinking purposes.

Venkateswara Reddy at Mutyalapadu in Chillakur mandal said they had not raised paddy crop this year due to lack of water. Other crops were also stopped, he added. Srinivasa Reddy explained that the banks did not reschedule farm loans despite District Collector making an appeal to bankers. Gudur legislator P Sunil Kumar who accompanied the team asked to declare Kota, Chittamuru and Vakadu mandals in his constituency as drought-hit areas. Even though, officials made arrangements for a meeting at Potupalem village in Chillakur mandal there were no farmers to interact with the team members.

They visited Chennur village in Gudur mandal where people asked for water from Telugu Ganga Project both for agriculture and drinking purposes. They informed that the situation would further worsen with increased scarcity for water after two months. They also visited Akkarapaka, Ozili and Graddagunta villages in the division. Apart from District Collector, Joint Director of Agriculture Hema Maheswar Rao, Gudur RDO Venkata Subbaiah and others were present.