JAIPUR: With monsoon approaching and farmers gearing up to sow the next crop, the Jaipur Development Authority (JDA) has a big challenge ahead to take possession of remaining acquired land for the ring road project.

As the clouds of uncertainty continue to hover over the project, even those farmers who had surrendered their lands are preparing to sow groundnut and bajra after rain this monsoon.

The District Rural Development Agency (DRDA), Vellore has adopted a cluster approach in undertaking various works under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in order to enable more villagers to get employment, according to N. Srinivasan, Project Officer of the DRDA.

Talking to newspersons at the Alangulam irrigation tank in Melappulam village panchayat in Arcot panchayat union where the work of deepening of the tank under MGNREGS was under progress on Wednesday, Mr. Srinivasan said that if there are more than 200 workers in a village panchayat, a new cluster would be started, comprising workers from a group of habitations. Under this approach,

BHUBANESWAR: The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has set its sights on Orissa to make it a hub of groundnut production. The premier agency has said it is focussing its seed and technological research to tap the unexplored resources of groundnut production in the State.

The fear of floods in the Bennihalla stream has come back to haunt the residents of the taluk.

The heavy rain in Dharwad area on Wednesday night led to an increase in the inflow into the streams creating a flood-like situation.

Kolar, Bangarpet, Srinivaspur among 70 drought-hit taluks in the State
The State government has declared Kolar, Malur and Bangarpet taluks drought-hit.
The scanty rainfall is estimated to cause huge crop loss in the district. Ragi sown prior to the monsoon is in the stage of developing ears. However, lack of rainfall has dealt a severe blow to the crop.

As per the data released by the Ministry of Agriculture here on Friday, the area under rice cultivation is 260.36 lakh hectares against 244.79 lakh hectares sown this time last year. Sown area has increased in Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, West Bengal and Assam. However, it is lower in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Odisha, Gujarat, Haryana and Punjabdue to insufficient rain.

Farmers would also be trained in production of quality seeds. The training modules would cover selection of varieties, seasonal application of bio-fertilizers, micro-nutrients and improved seed production technologies.

An agricultural research institute in India has developed hybrid varieties of pigeon pea (arhar), which promise to significantly raise output and cut import dependence for the produce.

It has been done by scientists from the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid-Tropics (Icrisat). Its headquarters are in India, at Hyderabad, but it is a global institute, not an Indian one.