Mumbai: The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief, Sharad Pawar, has demanded the that the state government should relax the restriction which stipulates only five cattle per family can be enrolled in the fodder camp. After visiting the cattle camp at Yalmar Mangewadi in the severe drought-hit Sangola tehsil of Solapur district on Tuesday, Pawar expressed concerns over inadequate support provided by the state government to the farmers and the cattle.
After voting in the Lok Sabha poll in Mumbai on Monday, Pawar has begun his tour of drought areas — Solapur and Osmanabad districts. On Tuesday, he was in Solapur. Mangewadi, the village which bragged of a yield of 2,000 litres of buffalo milk per day before the drought, can now barely obtain 200 litres of buffalo milk each day. Pawar demanded that the quantity of fodder given to cattle should be increased.
Currently, calves are given 15 kilograms of fodder per day. On learning that some villagers were unable to continue educating their children due to the drought situation, Pawar assured them his party would take care of such students.
Half of the state is under reeling of drought. In some talukas, such as Murbad and Ambarnath in Thane district, there were complaints against the tehsildar (the revenue officer of a tehsil) for failing to sanction tankers to provide drinking water in villages citing the election code of conduct being in place.
There were similar complaints from villagers in Beed, Osmanabad, Dhule and other parts of the state. Despite this, the taluka and district administration had refused to provide takers and rejected proposals for the setting up of fodder camps.
