Farmers have appealed to the Collector to take steps to remove wild boar from the list of protected wild animals as they were causing huge crop loss.

In a petition submitted to Collector M. Karunakaran at the weekly grievance day meeting held at the Collectorate here on Monday, M. S. Madasamy of Tamil Nadu Vivasayigal Sangam said that farmers, who had cultivated paddy, maize and vegetables at Ooththumalai, were facing severe crop loss due to invasion of wild boars from the nearby forests in the Western Ghats.

Since this region was home to thousands of wild boars, the animals raided the farms at night and damaged the crops, causing huge losses to the farmers.

The problem persisted for farmers in many other villages off Western Ghats. When farmers in Kerala faced a similar situation, the State government there removed wild boar from the list of protected wild animals so that the crops could be protected from the invading animals. And no case was registered against farmers even if any boar was killed.

Hence, the district administration should forward a recommendation to the State government to delist wild boar from the list of scheduled wild animals, Mr. Madasamy said.

Plea for DPCs

Another group of farmers led by P. Velumayil of Tamil Nadu Vivasayigal Sangam said the Collector should order opening of direct procurement centres (DPCs) across the district as ‘pisanam’ paddy harvest had begun in several places. Even after the beginning of harvest in Tenkasi, the DPC was yet to be opened, forcing the farmers to sell their produce to private rice mill owners. Similar situation was prevailing at Maanur also as the farmers had cultivated paddy on a few hundreds of acres using water from Maanur big tank.

Source - http://www.thehindu.com