YSRCP protests Nellore’s exclusion from drought-hit mandals

The YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) criticised the government on Monday for barring SPSR Nellore district from the State’s list of 388 drought-affected mandals, claiming that some mandals witnessed severe rainfall-deficit conditions.

The Opposition party demanded that 35 rainfall-deficit mandals of the district be reinstated, claiming that district officials cited strange reasons for not including the rainfall-deficit mandals.

YSRCP district president and former Agriculture Minister Kakani Govardhan Reddy, along with MLCs Parvathareddy Chandrasekhar Reddy, Anam Vijayakumar Reddy, Buduru Guravaiah, leaders of affiliated organisations, and activists, submitted a representation to District Collector Himanshu Shukla at the Collectorate in Nellore on Monday.

“Amid the prevailing El Niño conditions, the State government should include 35 rainfall-deficit mandals of Nellore district in the list of drought-affected mandals. The district officials have delayed in sending proposals to the government, and they are citing strange reasons for not including these mandals in the list,” Mr. Kakani said.

As per the field-level reports from the district officials, a high-level committee prepared the list of drought-hit mandals on September 30. The decision was based on the rainfall deficit recorded during the South-West Monsoon (Kharif) season. According to a three-tier evaluation mechanism, only those mandals that recorded above 50% rainfall deficit were included in the list.

Speaking to The Hindu, District Agriculture Officer (DAO) P. Satyavani said, “Our department has identified 30 mandals in the district and sent proposals to the government. However, the assessment of drought is based on various parameters such as rainfall deficit, dry spell, crop sown area, soil moisture stress, remote sensing, hydrology and yield-based criteria of below 50% yield loss.”

“Though 26 mandals have satisfied the tier-1 and tier-2 parameters, none of the mandals in the district have qualified under the yield loss parameter under the tier-3. Hence, none of the mandals in the district has fulfilled the drought parameters to be declared under the drought-affected list,” she informed.