Farmers in Haryana opting for vegetables to save groundwater

Chandigarh, April 21 (IANS) Farmer Ankur Kumar of Kurukshetra's Ban village in Haryana started vegetable farming on three acres in place of paddy. He produced about 1,700 crates of tomatoes from one acre and made a record sale of Rs 13 lakh, as per government figures.

He expressed gratitude to Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar for launching the 'Mera Pani-Meri Virasat' scheme in paddy-dominated districts, whose results are being seen on the ground.

Kumar said after adopting the scheme he abandoned traditional farming and adopted vegetable farming. Drip irrigation was adopted for vegetables, which also saved water, besides reducing agricultural input cost and increasing income.

Under the 'Mera Pani-Meri Virasat' scheme, the officials prepared two major schemes -- one is opting alternative crops like maize, and millets like jowar, instead of paddy, in which the farmers would get an incentive of Rs 7,000 per acre. The second is provision for financial assistance of Rs 4,000 per acre for direct-seeded rice (DSR) with zero tillage machine.

Earlier, the Chief Minister had started Kisan Samvad programmes to encourage the farmers of paddy-dominated districts to sow alternative crops to save water.

As a result, farmers saved 31,500 crore litres of water by adopting direct-seeded rice method in 72,000 acres during the kharif season of 2022 and the government gave an incentive amount of Rs 29.16 crore to the farmers.

With the increasing trend of the farmers, the Chief Minister in his Budget speech has announced setting a target of bringing 2 lakh acres of area under DSR in 2023-24.

In view of the upcoming kharif season 2023-24, after Bhiwani and Palwal districts, he has shifted his Jan Samvad programme to paddy-dominated district Kurukshetra where he will interact with the people in big villages from May 1 to 3 and appeal them to adopt the 'Mera Pani-Meri Virasat' scheme.

The Chief Minister had announced in the Vidhan Sabha that canals and channels that are more than 20 years old would be renovated in a phased manner.

Its effect is also visible on the ground in just two months, when on April 20, the foundation stone was laid for the restoration and renovation of about 44 km canal from Munak in Karnal to Khubdu in Sonipat district. The last lining of this part was done in 1972, almost 50 years ago.

After the formation of Haryana, this is a major project of the Irrigation Department under which the capacity of the canal will increase from 5,588 cusecs to 7,280 cusecs, an official statement said.

Also, the state government had allocated Rs 150 crore on the repair of pumpsets and other equipment with renovation of channels of South Haryana's Lift Irrigation Project.