But who can dare touch these products and its farmers? Any politician for that matter has no gumption to touch these products. Howsoever dedicated they are to their job, certain fields like sugar-cane, tobacco cannot be touched for want of political will.Every politician has his nimble fingers in these businesses. I will advertise to stop smoking or chewing. I will increase excise on these products every year. I will ban smoking in public. I have diabetes. But sugar is a necessity. Without 2 teaspoons of it, I cannot start my day. There will be no whiff of it from even the general public, who have voted them to power. They will talk of price rise over a cup of tea with 2 teaspoons of sugar. Drought or no drought, water is a must for these products.
Re: Sugar-cane & tobacco.
by Neha Sonakul on Apr 16, 2016 01:05 PM
Yes, sugar is a daily necessity, IPL is not. So water usage needs to be prioritised. You cannot stop eating sugar but surely one can stop watching clun level matches in Maha.
Giving figure of 85% of water goes for agriculture irrigation is completely wrong. Author should know that, if that is not used, what you will eat and what about the huge population which will be starved to death. Instead focussing on agriculture irrigation, unnecessary extravaganza water should be properly utilized.
While this is good information it is not new knowledge. It is known that Maharashtra is a drought prone state. We have had droughts in the early 70\'s when there was no talk of climate change and in subsequent years too there have been droughts. Yet the state has continued to promote water intensive crops and all work of drought proofing - supported by organisations like Nabard have been vitiated because of a lack of political will to change cropping patterns. The situation is critical and needs immediate attention not just by some knee jerk solutions but some strong policy decisions.
Finally, someone has the guts to tell the truth about the scoundrels who run both IPL and sugar factories in Maharashtra thathave not only wasted and coantnue to waste water but left behind salty arid fields through over fertilization na d excessive pesticide use.
Rediff says people should give up water and sugarcane to watch IPL..or is it because IPL money for advertisements is more important than water for people..?
But it will not help the cause because India lost in the semis, so ppl are not interested to see the failed stars of India that can only perform here, in fixed matches.
IPL is shere wastage of water. State must stop all this tamasha. Though this water may not be utilized there at Latur dirctly but in few of future needs of the same in the cities they must save the water.
This is totally misguiding article. By this logic all industries should be banned as they consume more than 200% water than required and at the same time pollute our rivers and ground water. Also people should stop wearing clothes as they waste lot of water in its production.
Is it too late to change our dietary preferences ? For e.g., rice and wheat are major consumers of water, but millets like jowar, bajra and ragi consume much less water while giving more energy / nutritional value. Then again, using jaggery or honey to sweeten tea, in place of sugar might be a healthier alternative as the harmful effects of sugar (or any refined substance) are well known. In fact, down South, people refer to sugar as the 'white poison'. If we persist with water wastage as it is, the day is not far off when Mr.Jaitley might surprise us with a water tax :(
