Parvesh Sharma
Sangrur, September 27
Untimely rain has caused damage to vegetables in around 100 villages of Malerkotla and Sangrur districts. The damage has hit the vegetable supply leading to rise in prices and hitting the consumers hard.
Rain has caused severe damage to cauliflower and cucumber. Some vegetable growers told The Tribune that much noise was being made for compensation to paddy growers, but none was talking about their losses.
Majority of vegetable growers have taken lands on annual lease at the rate of around Rs 65,000 per acre and they were uncertain about how they would arrange money to pay the instalments of their loans and to pay lease money.
Since damage has caused the supply to go down, the prices of almost all vegetables have witnessed an upward trend/ The price of cauliflower has increased to Rs 70 per kg from 50 a kg earlier, carrot is available at Rs 60 a kg and price of peas has increased to Rs 250 from Rs 180 to Rs 200 earlier.
“The cost of seeds of vegetables is in thousands. We request the state government to order a survey to assess the damage and announce financial aid for vegetable growers,” said Mahmood Akhtar Shad, chairman of the Farmers’ Federation, Punjab.
