Lucknow, Apr 1 (UNI) With rain and hailstorm damaging crops in the several districts of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Saturday said that protecting the interests of farmers is the priority of the government.
In a high-level meeting the CM reviewed the situation arising out of untimely rains and hailstorms recently in various areas of the state and gave necessary guidelines.
While observing a presentation of the Revenue Department regarding the updated status of the state, he said due to untimely rains and hailstorms in many areas of the state in the month of March farmers and agricultural produce have been adversely affected. "There is information of hailstorms in 9 districts of the state in the last 24 hours. In this hour of crisis, the state government stands with the farmers," he said.
He said according to meteorologists, this situation is likely to last for the next two-three days. "All necessary vigilance arrangements should be made for this. There should be no delay in providing the compensation amount to the farmers as per the rules by the Relief Commissioner's office after assessing their crops damaged by untimely rains and hailstorms," he said.
Yogi directed that timely information should be made available to the farmers about the weather forecast.
"Information about the warnings of meteorologists should be made available to farmers in remote villages through TV, newspapers and local administration. This forecast should be of 24 to 48 hours. When people will be alert, damages will also be less," he said.
He said if any resident of the state dies tragically due to natural calamity, or if someone is injured due to human-wildlife conflict, the victim's family should be contacted immediately and provided financial assistance from the Disaster Relief Fund at Relief Commissioner level.
The CM said due to natural reasons like rain, strong wind and the crop could get damaged. "The quality of the crop being produced is also likely to be adversely affected. Such crops should also be procured under the minimum support price. For this, a necessary proposal should be prepared to relax the rules as per the requirement," he said.
He said there could be a shortage of straw this year due to the possible loss of wheat crop. "In such a situation, arrangements for cattle fodder should be made in time by the Animal Husbandry Department," he directed.
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