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Crops wither, cattle die in 11 Indian states as water shortage spreads |
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April 28, 2000 NEW DELHI, APR 27 (AP) - Trains and navy ships were being readied Thursday to ferry water to India's parched states, where crops have withered, cattle are dying and humans are becoming desperate for drinking water.
Drought conditions, or prolonged periods of dryness leading to crop failure, exist in 11 of India's states, the national government said in a status report. It warned that food grain production will be drop by up to 30 percent, and oil seed crops will be cut in half in some of the worst hit areas.
The government's committee of Cabinet secretaries ordered the navy on Wednesday night to start shipping about 8,000 tons of drinking water from Bombay to the ports of western Gujarat state within a week. Special trains carrying livestock fodder have already started moving and the committee ordered Indian Railways to begin transporting drinking water, too.
Many of the village markets in Gujarat and Rajasthan states have food and fodder. But the residents, hit by their third drought in a year, have no money left to buy it. With cows, sheep and camels dying of thirst, those living on the edge have become destitute.
Villages have started expanding their local hand-dug reservoirs and cleanign wells. But both national and state governments are being blamed for not taking action earlier. Last year, the monsoon rains came late and brought less water than normal, and wells began drying up in Gujarat and Rajasthan as early as September.
The rains, not due for another two months, are forecast to be less wet again this year.
Gujarat state Information Minister Haren Pandya said that by March, the government had completed new pipelines, dams and wells and was managing the water scarcity in urban and rural areas, partly by sending water tankers to 2,000 villages.
However, Valijhibai Baghda, a leader of the opposition Congress party, said only 10 percent of the planned drought relief porojects had begun and that tankers, cattle feed and aid plans were being targeted to the areas represented by the governing Bharatiya Janata Party.
"The government has rarely been in a better position to actually minimize people's suffering," The Times of India said in an editorial Thursday calling on politicians to stop bickering and work on relief.
"Reserves of food grain are plentiful and if an action plan is chalked up without delay, systems can be put in place to deliver early relief." The newspaper called for plans such as pipelines and dams, which have been mired in controversy, to move ahead.
It also noted that drought had been kept at bay in areas where villagers had been encouraged to use traditonal means of water conservation, instead of waiting for the government to pipe in water. Villages that worked together to maintain wells, rainwater runoff channels and the centuries-old circular water pits, covered by domes, had been doing better, the Public Health Engineering Department.
However, in the desert state of Rajasthan, near the Pakistan border, even towns such as Barmer, where rain water running off rooftops has been collected and stored underground every year, the traditional method. The water rain out.
"This is the worst drought I have seen," said Ramai Ram, 70, joining other members of his village, Rohili, outside Barmer, in walking up to 10 kilometers (six miles) for water. "I have plenty of money but I can't buy water at my doorstep," he said.
According to the national government, 26.2 million people in Rajasthan are affected by the drought in 23,406 villages. More than 345,000 cattle were facing food shortages, but many were dying of thirst first.
The national government said in a status report published Thursday that 25 million people in 19,421 villages in Gujarat state have been affected by the drought, and crop failure has affected 7 million cattle.
With monsoons at least two months away, and weather forecasters predicting they will pack less rain than normal, the government said Gujarat's food grain production will be 30 percent less than last year, and the crop of oil seed - which village rs crush for use in cooking - will be cut in half.
In Andhra pradesh, 36.4 million people in 17,431 villages are affected, the government said. Endangered crops include maize, peanuts, sunflowers, castor and sugarcane.
Other states affected by water shortages and crop damage are Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, West Bengal, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura.
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