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Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa

In the imperial Gazetteer of India 1878, Pusa was recorded as a government estate of about 1350 acres in Darbhanba. It was acquired by East India Company for running a stud farm to supply better breed of horses mainly for the army. Frequent incidence of glanders disease (swelling of glands), mostly affecting the valuable imported bloodstock made the civil veterinary department to shift the entire stock out of Pusa. A British tobacco concern Beg Sutherland & co. got the estate on lease but it also left in 1897 abandoning the government estate of Pusa. Lord Mayo, The Viceroy and Governor General, had been repeatedly trying to get through his proposal for setting up a directorate general of Agriculture that would take care of the soil and its productivity, formulate newer techniques of cultivation, improve the quality of seeds and livestock and also arrange for imparting agricultural education. The government of India had invited a British expert. Dr. J. A. Voelcker who had submitted as report on the development of Indian agriculture. As a follow-up action, three experts in different fields were appointed for the first time during 1885 to 1895 namely, agricultural chemist (Dr. J. W. Leafer), cryptogamic botanist (Dr. R. A. Butler) and entomologist (Dr. H. Maxwell Lefroy) with headquarters at Dehradun (U.P.) in the forest Research Institute complex. Surprisingly, until now Pusa, which was destined to become the centre of agricultural revolution in the country, was lying as before an abandoned government estate. In 1898. Lord Curzon took over as the viceroy. A widely traveled person and an administrator, he salvaged out the earlier proposal and got London’s approval for the appointment of the inspector General of Agriculture to which the first incumbent Mr. J. Mollison (Dy. Director of Agriculture, Bombay) joined in 1901 with headquarters at Nagpur The then government of Bengal had mooted in 1902 a proposal to the centre for setting up a model cattle farm for improving the dilapidated condition of the livestock at Pusa estate where plenty of land, water and feed would be available, and with Mr. Mollison’s support this was accepted in principle. Around Pusa, there were many British planters and also an indigo research centre Dalsing Sarai (near Pusa). Mr. Mollison’s visits to this mini British kingdom and his strong recommendations. In favour of Pusa as the most ideal place for the Bengal government project obviously caught the attention for the viceroy.

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Author: MALLICK, BISWAJIT × End date: 2022 ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    A STUDY ON VULNERABILITY AND RESILIENCE AMONG FARMERS IN CYCLONE AFFECTED DISTRICTS OF ODISHA
    (DRPCAU, PUSA, 2022) MALLICK, BISWAJIT; Lal, Sudhanand Prasad
    Climate change is a global phenomenon. Agriculture and allied sector is at alarming position as it is highly vulnerable to climate change. Global population is exposed to frequent and intensive hazards, viz., cyclones, drought, floods, heat waves, melting glaciers, and increasing sea levels due to climate change and human interventions. Among all the hazards, cyclones are one of the most frequent and leading natural hazards worldwide that causes massive causalities. Considering all these factors, the present study was carried out in Ganjam and Puri district of Odisha to examine farmers' vulnerability to distinct cyclones. Both the districts were selected purposively because out of six coastal districts these two were highly prone to cyclonic events. Total of 2 blocks from each district; thus total of 4 blocks were chosen through the application of computer-based research randomizer technique to eliminate the bias. Total of 8 villages were taken from the 4 blocks, i.e., two villages per block. Twenty respondents were chosen randomly from each of the eight villages. Thus, a total of 160 respondents were selected for the present investigation. The vulnerability index was developed following Analytical Hierarchy Process (Saaty, 2008). Resilience in relation "A Study on Vulnerability and Resilience among Farmers in Cyclone Affected Districts of Odisha" to farmers' life was determined by RFL-Scale developed by Lal (2014). Reliability and validity was tested for the RFL-Scale scale. Finally, constraints were ranked that were encountered by farmers to cope up with cyclone vagaries following Garrett's Ranking method (1979). Data were collected by the researcher through direct observation, personal interviews, focus group discussion, and well-structured interview scheduled prepared and verified by experts. Statistical tools used in this study to analyze the data were Mean, Frequency, Percentage, Standard Deviation, Standard Error, Computer-based research randomizer technique, Analytical Hierarchy Process, Multi Nomial Logit Model (MNLM), and Garrett's Ranking Method. It was evident from the result that most of the respondents were middleaged, male, scheduled caste, married, nuclear family, and had pucca houses. The majority of respondents had completed a medium level of educational year, medium year of farming Experience, medium level of social participation, medium level of family income, medium extension contact, and medium range of mass media exposure. Respondents had low livestock holding, marginal land holding, and high community participation. Nearly two-third of total respondents (63.75%) were moderately vulnerable, followed by (20%) and (16.25%) of respondents were vulnerable and less vulnerable, respectively. It was observed that most of the respondents (73.75%) and (78.75%) were moderately vulnerable in Ganjam and Puri districts, respectively. In district-wise comparison, Puri was more vulnerable than Ganjam, with mean values (-0.295 ± 0.018) and (0.241 ± 0.015), respectively. Age (P=0.045) and community Participation (P=0.016) were found to be negatively significant at 5%, affecting respondents' vulnerability to fall in the moderately vulnerable category and vulnerable category, respectively. Keeping other factors constant, one unit increase in age reduces the probability of respondents to fell into moderately vulnerable category by factor 0.854, which is about 15%. When other factors were constant, increase in one unit in community participation decreases probability of respondents to fall under vulnerability category by factor 0.276. The odds ratio shows that a decrease in community participation by one unit reduces the vulnerability by 72%. Land holding and sex were positively significant at 1%, increasing the likelihood of respondents falling into the moderately vulnerable to vulnerable category. Land holding is with fair Wald statistics 11.437 and odds ratio 7.875. Experience in Farming, Secondary Income, and Social Participation were found to be positively significant at 10% level. The odds ratio shows that increase experience in farming by one unit increases the farmers’ vulnerability by 13.3%. It was elicited that, as per respondents, multipurpose cyclone shelter with global priority (GP=0.11) was most responsible for adaptive capacity and availability of grazing land area (GP=0.02) was least responsible for adaptive capacity, respectively. In the RFL-Scale most of the respondents (47.50%) were vulnerable, followed by coping (28.12%), fragile (15.62%), resilient (5.63%), and in need (3.13%). Among social constraints, "damage to residential as well as other infrastructures" was most important with Garrett's value (62.38). Economic constraints "huge loss to cultivated crops" was ranked first with Garrett's score (62.72). In environmental constraints, respondents perceived "rain and storms lead to flooding after cyclone" (64.53) was ranked as the most important among four broad constraints. Top most miscellaneous constraint perceived by respondents was "unavailability of food and clean drinking water" (61.52) in the study area.