First the prolonged drought, then a large number of suicides by farmers, and now the floods - Marathwada along with Vidharbha in Maharashtra and Bundelkhand in UP, remains in news for tragic reasons. Although, majority of the states in India have agrarian economy, none of regions make more news than Marathawada.
BCCL
On Tuesday, ?Maharashtra government announced a hefty package of ?Rs 49, 248 crore for Marathawada, arguably facing apathy for a over four decades now.
However, this year's monsoons have been kind enough to the region as rain has filled all the dams initially. Now the rains seems to have become a bane for the region.?
Reuters
The Marathwada region has received 140.3% more rains than the average annual rainfall. The rainfall in the region from June 1 to September 30 is 556.1 mm. In the last three days, it has received 581.5% excess rains as compared to the average annual rainfall which caused havoc in various districts of region.?
Why whatever happens in Marathwada eventually turns into a bane for its people?
Barely 300 kms from the state capital Mumbai, Marathwada, a ?region which constitute eight districts with population of 1.87 crore has been seeing drought at regular intervals since last four decades. The region has seen big droughts in years 1899, 1918, 1972 and 2012 onwards, which now have ended thanks to the rains, which have opened another front to grapple with.
Reuters
During the previous droughts, food and fodder were main concerns, but the current prolonged drought since 2012, brought people and cattle of the region to struggle for water to drink, forget water for crops.?
In the absence of rains, borewell became the main source of irrigation, which again takes a toll not only on farmers as it exceeds the cost of the production of crops, but also on the ground water reserves which are anyways decrease due to prolonged drought.
There is severe depletion in groundwater level in all the talukas. Highest depletion has taken place in Hingoli (-4.35m), followed by Osmanabad (-4.13m), Parbhani (-2.87m), Latur (-2.52m), Nanded (-1.60m), Aurangabad (-0.94m) and Beed (- 0.34m). ?
It is reported that at least 10,000 new bores came into existence since 2012.?
Marathwada remains one of most farmer suicide hit region in the region. Especially in the last few years, precisely since 2012, the region witnesses over 700 farmer suicides every year. For example in 2012 itself, over 400 farmer suicides were registered in Marathwada, where all over toll in Maharashtra crossed 1,500 mark.
Reuters
The region has now overshadowed even Vidharbha, the region believed to be hotbed of farmer suicides. In 1995, India saw over 3 lakh farmers committing suicides, Maharashtra ?accounts for maximum number of these suicides followed by UP and MP.?
Over the years, the shares of agriculture in India's economy has decreased and people have opted for other means to earn livelihood. Some may call it the main reason why a large population is heading major metropolises or the towns which are more industrialized.?
Reuters
Roughly, 59 pe rcent of India's population was earning its bread and butter from agriculture sector in the begging of this century and now if 2011 census is to be believed roughly 52 per cent of total population is employed in agriculture.
But in Marathwada, over 60 per cent of the population is still engaged in farming which is marred by constant drought, inadequate irrigation infrastructure and lack of ?substantial measures for the state.
Despite being landlocked region, Marathwada has water resources, if not adequate, but the region isn't that short of ?water resources either. Godavari river and its tributaries such as Purna, Shivna, Dudhna, Vedganga, Sindhphana, Bindusara are the main rivers in the region.?
However, Godavari, is the only perennial river. Major dams in Godavari basin are Bhandardara in Ahmednagar, Jayakwadi Stage 1 in Aurangabad, Upper Dudhna in Jalna, and Lower Dudhna in Parbhani, Sindhphana and Bendsura in Beed, Majira in Latur, and Ujjani in Aurangabad, etc.?
Reuters
All the reservoirs receive water during rainy season, but due to the failure of monsoon, many reservoirs are dry. But there is more to this problem other than drought which guzzles the water stored in the dams. There have been stories of big politicians having stakes in sugar mills across the state. Large plantation of sugarcane in certain areas at the behest of these politicians results in flawed distribution of water from reservoirs which eventually leads to failure of crops other than the sugarcane. In Marathwada alone, if estimates are to be belied sugarcane requires 4,300 MCM of water for the entire season, which leads to problem of water shortage for other uses. In Maharashtra, roughly 4 per cent of land is under sugarcane cultivation but it consumes as much as 71.5 per cent of irrigated water, including that from wells.
Maharashtra Chief Minister, Devendra ?Fadnavis, on Tuesday announced a hefty package of Rs 49, 248 crores for Marathwada region and a fare chunk of these money is believed to spent on the development of water infrastructure and resources in the region.
Reuters
Under the plan announced by the CM, Rs 9,291 crore will be spent on irrigation, Rs 5,326 crore on railway network in the region, Rs 3,000 crore for road projects, Rs 250 crore for airport expansion, Rs 450 crore for micro-irrigation, and Rs 1,885 for water conservation works.