Despite a spurt in monsoon in east and central India along with western coast in the past few days, the government remains concerned over the prospects of the kharif crop.

On Wednesday, as the Met department’s forecast till July 13 said monsoon would remain active over many parts of the country outside northwest India, which comprises food grain basket Punjab and Haryana, Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar held a meeting of top officials of Agriculture, Meteorological and Water Resources departments to review the prospects of the ongoing kharif season. The meeting was also attended by Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar.

While the rains in central and eastern India have brought some cheers to the government, the deficient rainfall in paddy-growing northwest region remained a cause of concern with the Met department predicting bleak prospects of monsoon activities over the region.

Though the government hoped to compensate the decline in paddy by sowing of oilseeds, primarily in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, the worries remained since the sowing of paddy crop in northwest is not only lagging behind the last year (2008-09) levels, which had seen early monsoon, but also behind the sowing pattern of 2007-08.

The government worries are further compounded by the poor power situation in the region which is sure to impact irrigation activities. In addition, the diesel price hike is also likely to play spoilsport for farmers.