During a year of unprecedented drought, which has accentuated the agricultural crisis in Karnataka, the political response to the farmers’ economic distress has come under the scanner.
This year, the south west monsoon was one of the worst in recent years. The State was left with a 25% rainfall deficiency as it received 642 mm of rain against the normal of 852 mm between June 1 and October 31. Rainfall was skewed. Rainfall was neither uniformly distributed nor timely. This resulted in crop loss and a decline in yield.
The cumulative storage in the major reservoirs was 452.91 thousand million cubic (TMC) feet against the gross storage capacity of 895.62 TMC ft (50.56% of the installed capacity) as on November 17. The crop loss has been pegged at more than ₹30,000 crore. Though the Congress government has declared 223 taluks out of 236 as drought-affected, the farmers are peeved that it has not announced any drought-relief measures to attenuate their hardship.
