BK Business Desk

Poonch, Jan 20: Department of Agriculture today provided free of cost Maize Cob-Shellers to 10 different Panchayats of Block Mankote and Block Mendhar under Capex Budget in Sub Division Mendhar.
During the programme, Sarpanches of Mankote, Upper Kasblari, Upper Salani, Chhajla Lower and Ghani Dharati of Block Mankote besides Salwah Upper, Banola, Pathnateer, Kalbuaban Takyia, Salwah and Chaperdhara of block Mendhar were present to receive their Maize CobShellers .
Vice Chairman District Development Council Poonch, Engineer Mohammad Ashfaq presided over the function. The Maize CobShellers have been provided to Panchayats for community Use. It will be considered as property of the Panchayat and shall be handed over to the next PRI.
Maize is grown as the main staple crop in district Poonch and majority of farmers manage Maize cob sheller for shelling of Cobs on rent basis.
Keeping in view the requirement of Maize CobShellers in every Panchayat, the department of agriculture proposed 229 cobshellers to cover all the Panchayats of the District Poonch in a phased manner.
Sub Division Agriculture Officer Mendhar, Harvinder Singh said 58 Panchayats of the block out of total 75 have been covered and remaining 17 shall also be covered in due course.
Subject Matter Specialists, Aksir Singh and Manmohan Singh; Agriculture Ext.officer Sudheer Sharma, concerned JAEOs/AEAs and Technical officer of Sub Div.Mendhar, Sudheer Bakshi were present on the occasion.