Anantapur/Tirupati: The Mandous cyclone resulted in massive damage to outstanding crops at their peak stage, including the paddy in Rayalaseema region.
The paddy crop was badly hit in areas under the Tungabhadra High Level Main Canal in Anantapur district. The farmers had harvested paddy from more than 7,5000 acres mostly in Kanekal, Uravakonda and Bommanhal areas in the district. The stocks got wet and resulted in sprouting due to the continuous rain and unfavourable climatic conditions.
Official reports said more than 11,500 hectares of agriculture crops got damaged due to the untimely rainfall in YSR district. The cyclone impact was heavy in 134 villages across 20 mandals due to the five days of rainfall.
Farmers incurred heavy loss after the paddy crop was flooded and the sprouting started. In Veerannapalya alone, crops on at least 3,700 hectares were damaged.
YSR district collector Vijayarama Raju said the horticulture and agriculture departments were assessing the crop loss and listing out farmers who incurred losses at various stages of their crop maturity.
In Kurnool district, crops on about 10,778 hectares were badly damaged. In addition, paddy farmers incurred huge losses as their stocks got wet and led to sprouting.
Sources said paddy was sown in more than 67,000 acres in Kurnool area mostly under TB lower-level canal and Handri Neeva Sujala Sravanthi main canal and the connecting tanks. Huge quantity of paddy was damaged when the farmers were about to sell their stocks to FCI and in the markets.
YSRC MLA Meda Mallikarjuna Reddy has advised the Annamayya district collector to speed up the process of submitting a report over the crop loss to the government and ensure justice to the farmers.
TD politburo member Kalava Srinivasulu blamed the government for failing to procure paddy in time from the farmers, which led to major loss for them in the kharif season.
The Tirupati district administration has pegged the loss arising out of the cyclonic storm Mandous and the resultant rains, which battered 46 villages and seven urban areas spread over 22 mandals at Rs 226 crore.
District collector Venkata Ramana Reddy said preliminary losses were estimated up to 3 pm on Tuesday, based on the information from the fields. Agriculture crops were damaged in 8,215 hectares and horticulture crops in 545.5 hectares, he said.
About other damage due to the rain, he said that in all, 142.19km of R&B roads and 147.6km of panchayat roads were damaged. About 105 houses were damaged while 3,500 houses were submerged in rainwater. Around 16 cattle, seven sheep and goats died during the rain. The municipal administration department has reported a loss of Rs 461.22 lakh.
While the irrigation department reported Rs 21.30 crore as losses, the losses to the rural water supply department was put at Rs 69.2 lakh. The fisheries department losses were at Rs 60.7 lakh while the APSPDCL reported losses of Rs 19.78 crore.
The district administration has provided temporary rehabilitation to 1,416 people at 12 relief camps. One NDRF team with 32 members and one SDRF team with 26 members were deployed to take up rescue operations. The final reports would be readied within a week, the collector said and added that all help would be extended to the affected people and temporary relief will be provided to them as per the rules.
