The Mela Puliyangudi farmers have appealed to Collector M. Karunakaran to ensure the early construction of Vaazhamalaiyaar dam in their area and also a team of officials to extend proper guidance to deal with the pest attack in lemon.

In the petition submitted to the Collector, the farmers said a mysterious pest attack in the lemon trees, all yielding for the past several years, had seriously affected the trees which were on the verge of dying shortly.

Hence, the officials concerned should be directed to help the affected farmers by extending proper suggestion to neutralise the pest attack.

Moreover, the crop loss suffered by the farmers should be compensated adequately and the chemical and organic nutrients for lemon trees be given with cent per cent subsidy.

The Vaazhamalaiyaar dam construction proposal, which had been gathering dust for the past several years, should be revived since more than 1,500 open wells in Mela Puliyangudi region would become dry and over 3,000 hectares of cultivable land would become barren if the much-awaited project was not executed.

Besides the Vaazhamalaiyaar dam, steps should be taken for the construction of check-dams at various vantage points to augment groundwater table, the farmers said. “We’ve forwarded copies of this petition to the Chief Minister and the Minister for Agriculture also,” said R. Abdul Wahab, secretary of Mela Puliyangudi Farmers’ Association.

Another group of farmers from Melapalayam submitted a petition to the Collector seeking his intervention to stop the conversion of cultivable lands in their area into housing plots.

“As we’ve cultivated paddy, a particular group of people are disturbing our farming activities by purposely bringing the cattle for grazing in the cultivated lands. Since this strategy being employed by a particular group to discourage farmers from cultivating crop triggers tension, the Collector should intervene bring back normalcy,” said the farmers.

Source - https://in.newshub.org