Members of the NGO and farmers at the seed distribution programme in Tezpur on Monday

Oct. 2: They lost everything to floods except their will to survive. For the 1,400-odd farmers of Balipara, the road to rehabilitation is a long one, but they are confident of finding their way with a little help from an NGO.

Balipara Foundation, founded by the company that owns Addabarie tea estate, has embarked on a unique social service programme to assist the flood-ravaged farming community of Balipara, Lokra and Charduar get back what they have lost.

The NGO distributed certified seeds of mustard, arahar and urad dal to over 1400 farmers from 20 villages of the district in Tezpur yesterday.

The primary objective of the programme is to help the farmers overcome the financial losses caused by the destruction of their crops in the recent floods. Officials of the agriculture department attended the function.

“This is the first step towards meeting our objective of facilitating and driving community-level involvement and income-generation for sustainable wealth creation,” Robin Eastment, the manager (operations) of the organisation, said.

Balipara Foundation intends to create opportunities for farmers with community involvement.

Sonitpur was among the districts that bore the brunt of the third wave of floods this year with vast tracts of agricultural land completely submerged. The floods came at a time when farmers had just started sowing sali crops.

Balipara Foundation is working in collaboration with institutional agencies to make seeds available to farmers. The seeds distributed to farmers in Sonitpur have been procured from the National Seeds Corporation, New Delhi.

“We asked the farmers what kinds of seeds they required and all other technical inputs they wanted,” an official of the foundation said.

The organisation hopes that its collaborations with institutional agencies for grants will enable it to sustain distribution of seeds free of charge to farmers. Even if the NGO does not receive funds, farmers will have to pay only a nominal price for the seeds.

Apart from seeds, Balipara Foundation has been promoting vermiculture as a cost-effective way to maximise crop yield. The programme is being conducted in collaboration with Morarka Foundation of Rajasthan.

The NGO has also offered to buy the farmers’ produce to protect them from unscrupulous middlemen.