Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has directed officials to provide relief to farmers whose crops have been damaged due to recent rains and hailstorms in the state. He also condoled the loss of lives in the state due to various calamities and instructed the district magistrates to immediately distribute the permissible relief amount from the state disaster response fund (SDRF) to the families of the deceased.
The chief minister on Saturday held a high-level meeting to review the situation arising out of recent untimely rains and hailstorms in various areas of the state and issued necessary guidelines to the officials. In the survey conducted from March 15 till now, a total of 3,4137.52 hectares of agricultural area in 10 districts and a total of 1,02,497 farmers have been hit due to the unseasonal rains and hailstorms in the state.
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Hailstorms have hit Pilibhit, Bareilly, Sitapur, Aligarh, Moradabad, Sonbhadra, Hamirpur, Sambhal and Unnao districts recenty and assessment of crop damage is being done.
Earlier, Outlook reported that the harvest of wheat, mustard, mango crops stands disrupted amid unseasonal rain, hailstorms, and high winds. Moreover, the wheat crop has faced the additional brunt of unnaturally high temperature that immediately preceded unseasonal downpour.
The rain and storms have flattened wheat crops in several areas. Moreover, storms and high winds have resulted in mango falling off the trees falling prematurely, thus adversely affecting the yield. Higher temperatures that preceded the downpour also caused damage to wheat crop as premature higher temperatures disrupt growth of wheat grain, resulting in the grain getting squeezed and becoming inferior in quality.
