Bhubaneswar: District Collectors have been directed to disburse agriculture input subsidy in accordance with issued guidelines to farmers in pest affected areas of Odisha within a week.

“District Collectors have been asked to furnish details about disbursement of agriculture input subsidy to farmers whose crops have been affected by pest attack as well as by drought on a daily basis to the SRC’s office. The process has already begun. They have been asked to complete the process within seven days,” informed Special Relief Commissioner (SRC) Bishnupada Sethi to newsmen today.

Sethi said disbursements for this will be made from the State Disaster Relief Fund (SDRF) and funds won’t be sought from Centre for the purpose.

On the other hand, he said the State government has written to the Centre to amend some rules pertaining to SDRF and National Disaster Relief Fund (NDRF) while adding that State Chief Secretary A P Padhi has written to the Union Home department on this account.

The State government has written to Centre for raising agricultural input subsidy currently being paid to farmers in rain-fed and irrigated areas in the event of crop damage by 50 percent, the SRC said.