Trichy: The Gaja-affected farmers have accused the state and Centre of not following the order of the Madurai bench of Madras High Court when it comes to extending the deadline for the payment of crop insurance premium for Cyclone-hit delta districts.In an order issued by a justice, K K Sasidharan and P D Audikesavalu stated that the Central government must consider the plea of farmers for the extension of time for the paddy farmers of the cyclone-hit district for payment of the same. The court had instructed the state government to take up the issue with the Union government, farmers said.In a writ petition filed by petitioner G Thirumurugan, praying the court to direct the state and Centre to declare Gaja cyclone and its consequence in the state a national disaster under the Disaster Management Act 2005, the petitioner had asked the court to order the state and Union governments to extend the last date for the payment of insurance premium from November 30 to December 15.The Secretary of Thanjavur District Cauvery Farmers Protection Association Swamimalai R Vimalnathan said that farmers from cyclone-hit districts have been asking the both the governments to extend the date till December 15. However, no one paid heed to it, he alleged.“Due to climatic changes after the cyclone hit, thousands of acres of paddy crop were affected by insects. In many places, crops have withered. If the government would have extended the last date till December 15, the affected farmers could have paid their premium and ultimately a number of farmers would have benefitted,” he said.Even though the court had ordered to take steps to extend the last date, both the governments have been remaining silent, he alleged.Meanwhile, a senior official from the agriculture department in Chennai said that the state had put pressure on the Centre asking it to extend the last date to December 15. However, they did not approve the demand, but gave time till December 31 to upload all the documents collected from the farmers, he said.“Fifteen-day exemption has been given to the cooperative and commercial banks in cyclone Gaja hit districts like Nagapattinam, Tiruvarur, Thanjavur and Pudukottai, to upload the documents since power supply has not been restored in many cyclone-hit rural pockets of the districts,” the officials said.When contacted, Agriculture Secretary Gagandeep Singh Bedi told TOI that without extending time, the number of farmers who had paid their insurance premium was much more, when compared to last year.

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