Cotton farmers prone to spurious seed menace

 ADILABAD: Farmers have started agriculture operations with the onset of rains much before the rainy season in the erstwhile Adilabad district.

However, the farmers will go for sowing cotton seeds in the last week of May with uncertain rains.

There is a tradition that farmers consider ‘Mirugu’ as auspicious and start sowing seeds on that day in the month of June. But many farmers start sowing seeds in the last week of May.

The cotton farmers are going to face the spurious cotton seed menace this season, just like last year.

Already, many businessmen and middlemen have stocked the spurious cotton seeds in the villages, and they will start selling them in the coming days.

Police seized spurious cotton seeds and arrested two persons in Bheemini mandal in February’s second week in Bellampalli Assembly constituency in Mancherial district.

This shows that spurious cotton seeds have already gained entry into the interior villages, especially in Komaram Bheem Asifabad and Mancherial districts.

The middlemen and local businessmen are procuring these spurious cotton seeds through Andhra middlemen from Kurnool and Guntur districts in Andhra Pradesh and also from bordering Maharashtra and Gujarat states.

Thandur, Bheemini, and Rebbena mandals are hubs of the spurious cotton seed business.

Agents of businessmen who are supplying spurious cotton seeds from Maharashtra and Gujarat are selling them to the gullible farmers of villages in bordering mandals located on the state borders.

Farmer Rupesh of Bela said, “The sale of spurious cotton seeds will begin secretly in the interior villages by the agents, and there will be uncertainty of the germination of such seeds.”

He said the police and agriculture departments must keep a close watch on the sale of spurious cotton seeds in the villages since many farmers were suffering losses due to the lack of germination of spurious seeds.