Maharashtra farmers race ahead with sowing, top official hopeful of no resowing

Agriculture commissioner Dheeraj Kumar, while speaking to The Indian Express, expressed optimism that the state would not see any incidents of resowing as the monsoon picked up.

The monsoon has been on and off in Maharashtra. Till the end of June, the state received 147.7 mm of rain, compared with the 207.6 mm of rain it was supposed to get. Barring the districts in the Pune division, the rest of the state has reported around 60-100 per cent of normal rainfall. Aurangabad, the largest division in the state, has in fact reported 102.2 per cent rainfall. Pune, however, continues to be a matter of concern with only 42.9 per cent rainfall being reported from the division.

Kumar said rainfall was regular in the past 15 days. Although heavy showers are yet to be reported, most areas received continual drizzles. “This has helped sowing,” he said.

As of end-June, the state has seen 59.31 lakh hectares of sowing, an increase from last year’s 55.05 lakh hectares. “We hope the monsoon will arrive in the weeks to come, and sowing will be completed by mid-July,” he said.

On a year-on-year basis, most crops have reported an increase in acreage. But crops like soybean (20.76/21.58 lakh hectares), jowar (4.08/5.98 lakh hectares), tur (4.95/5.55 lakh hectares) have reported a dip in sowing. Cotton, another major kharif crop, has seen a major increase with farmers sowing the crop over 23.91 lakh hectares, compared with 19.58 lakh hectares last year.

Kumar hoped the state would not see any incidents of resowing. “Soil moisture is sufficient and we hope this will continue for the rest of the sowing window,” he said. However, in some areas, urad and moong would be replaced by cotton and soybean. This is mainly because of the sowing window getting over without enough soil moisture.