Kendrapara: In a predominantly agricultural district like Kendrapara share-croppers are a harassed lot. They are slowly turning away from cultivation as both the land owners and the administration are not sympathetic to their problems.
Most of the times, they resort to distress sale of their crops. The share-croppers are in no mood to carry out farming this year.
Claiming themselves to be farmers, the landowners are grabbing all the benefits of the state-sponsored KALIA scheme and the Centre-sponsored PM Kisan Yojana while the share-croppers are remaining deprived of the benefits.
The administration and the lending agencies are equally apathetic to their problems. The banks are not inclined to give them loans as they are share-croppers and do not have any land of their own.
The share-croppers are also facing a host of problems in selling their paddy crops during kharif and rabi seasons. Farmer leader Bijay Kumar Parida said out of the total land owned by 3 lakh farmers, 70 per cent of the land is cultivated by share-croppers.
The share-cropper takes the land on lease for a year from land owner. The share-cropper has to pay half of the harvested paddy in kharif season and two-fifth of harvested crops in rabi season to the land owners.
The sharecroppers has to take all the risks associated with farming such as natural calamities and the land owner never helps him in any way.
The share-croppers also face problems in availing bank loans and during paddy procurement. Pramod Kumar Sahu, president of a primary agriculture cooperative society (PACS), said only 15 per cent of the farmers till their own land while the rest of the land is cultivated by share-croppers.
However, the share-croppers are yet to be identified for which they are being deprived of bank loans, crop insurance and other benefits.
Gayadhar Dhal, president of Kendrapara district farmers’ and labourers’ association, said the state government had convened a meeting to identify share-croppers in 2015.
The meeting had lengthy discussions on the problems of sharecroppers and their inclusion in all agriculture related schemes and social security measures.
However, six years have passed since then but there has been no progress on the issue. As a result, the share-croppers have failed to get their names enrolled in schemes like KALIA and PM Kisan, Dhal added.
A land owner Trilochan Jena of Indupur village under Kendrapara block said there are some obstacles in giving legal sanction to share-croppers.
The issues like lease agreement and share of the land owner on the harvest should be discussed threadbare before bringing in any legislation on the issue.
A law for share-croppers will increase their interest towards cultivation but the ownership of the land should be protected, he added.
A farmer Satyabrata Senapati of Mahakalapara said land is a family property which protects the owners in difficult times. If the land is legally given on lease to the share-croppers then it would create problems in its sale to other persons at times of exigencies.
Amiya Behera, a farmer of Dumuka village under Marshaghai block, said, “Distress sale of paddy, lack of government assistance during natural calamities and lack of other benefits are discouraging share-croppers from taking up farming.”
PNN