Click to play videoMuzaffarnagar: Sukka has had to uproot his sugarcane plants three months before the crop was to be harvested. The crop would have seen him for two years, but Sukka is now using it to feed his cattle. With the rain gods failing, he watched helplessly as his field was starved of water.
"Everything has dried up. We are staring at hunger," says Sukka who is a marginal farmer.
There is little food, and no sugar in Sukka's house. With Sugar prices at a high of Rs 32 a kilo in Betawada, it is a luxury that his family can do without.
"We don't even have tea anymore," says Sukka.
Even poor farmers have risked everything they had in trying to save their sugarcane crop. Most of the sugarcane is ending up as cattle field and now the real fodder for cattle is also drying up.
Sugarcane is the lifeblood of Muzaffarnar. The town has 11 sugar mills with thousands of farmers depending on it for their livelihood. This year, there is a fall of nearly 20,000 hectares in sugarcane cultivation. Last year, 98862 hectares was cultivated but this year the area is down to 86440 hectares.
Experts say due to the prevailing drought, the productivity of standing crop is likely to fall by at least 20 per cent. The productivity of paddy is down by 29,000 hectares.
ADM Finance, Ravindra Godbole says, "Because of the drought, farmers are shifting to planting fodder for cattle."
Muzaffarnagar is staring a loss of at least 10 million tonnes of sugarcane this year and sugar production in Uttar Pradesh is estimated to fall from 7.3 million tonnes last year to 6. 2 million tonnes this year.
Sugar production in India is likely to fall from 26 million tonnes to 16 million tonnes and retail prices of sugar have jumped by 58 per cent from Rs 17 a kilo to almost Rs 30 a kilo. Sukka's failed crop - and that of other farmers like him - has had a ripple effect on rising prices.
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