Southern States - Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad   

Irrigation projects brook no delay, says Plan panel member

By Our Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD Aug. 23. Som Pal, Member of the Planning Commission, on Saturday suggested launching a Rs.1,15,000-crore irrigation programme of completing ongoing major and medium projects across the country besides taking up new minor and water recharging structures, all of which had the potential to irrigate 60 million hectares in five to eight years.

He juxtaposed this with the ambitious Inter Linking of Rivers project costing a whopping Rs. 5,60,000 crores and "which might take 20 to 100 years for completion'' to indicate his preference but hastened to clarify that he was not against this project. "Both of them should be complementary and go together,'' he said, addressing a press conference here.

Of the Rs. 1,15,000 crores, which he said was estimated by the Commission could be mobilised by both Central and the State Governments, Rs. 77,000 crores could be allotted for 400 ongoing major and medium projects, Rs. 13,000 crores for minor irrigation projects and Rs. 24,500 crores for water recharging structures, having the irrigation potential of 21.5 million hectares, 15 million hectares and 24.5 million hectares respectively. "This can insulate 80 percent of area from the vagaries of nature at one-fifth of the cost of Inter Linking of Rivers project''.

He lamented that irrigation and agriculture were not being given the importance they deserved. The Centre's annual allotment of Rs. 1300 crores for irrigation was just enough for meeting the salary bill of the engineers and the staff. As for agriculture, the investment has been steadily coming down and now it was a mere 1.3 percent of the GDP, though its contribution to GDP was 25 percent, employed 56.7 percent of the total labour and still sustained 69 per cent of the population.

It was unfortunate that 77 million hectares of land was still unutilised and there was no plan by the Centre or the States to bring this into cultivation by assigning it to the poor, marginal and small farmers, as recommended by the Bhanu Pratap and Sharad Joshi committees in 1990 and a Parliamentary Standing Committee in 1994.

The Government was unable to protect the interest of farmers whenever the prices of agriculture produce came down, he said and sought removal of all restrictions on movement of foodgrains and funding by banks. Efforts were also needed to protect the rich genetic diversity of plants and animals, besides encouraging cultivation of medicinal and aromatic plants, through contract farming in a tie-up with companies.

On WTO, he said India should insulate the agriculture sector by creating tariff walls like in oil seeds and vociferously argue for lumping together all the agriculture subsidies given by the developed countries to their farmers. India should also make it clear that there would be any further negotiations if the implementation issues raised in Doha, were not fulfilled.

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