Berhampur: IMD’s yellow warning and orange warning for Ganjam and Gajapati districts on Nov 18-19 and Nov 19-20 of heavy to very heavy rainfall has left flood-hit farmers in Ganjam district extremely worried about the fresh impending cyclonic storm and its impact on the district.The standing paddy crop is at the harvesting stage. If rain lashes the districts, the crop would be damaged, fear farmers. Over 83,400 hectares of standing paddy were damaged in the rain and flood caused by severe cyclone Arnab. This year, paddy was cultivated on around 2.18 lakh hectares. “As per our estimate, only 5 to 7% of crops have been cut so far,” said Manoranjan Roul, chief district agriculture officer (CDAO).“We have asked farmers with harvester machines (simultaneous cutting and threshing) to cut the crop and store it in safer places,” he said. But only limited number of farmers have such machines. “We cannot cut the crop now as the land is still muddy,” said Niranjan Mohanty, a farmer in Baiganabadi.Collector said they have prepared over 1000 temporary shelter centres in the district. The people in the landslide prone areas and hill areas will be shifted to the safer places. Engineers of water resources department will release water from the reservoirs and dams.Farmers said they would suffer huge loss if fresh rain lashes the district. “All hopes of harvesting paddy will be shattered if the district gets untimely rain,” said Sangram Sanatan Singh of Nalihada.Meanwhile, engineers of water resources department have issued notices to release water from reservoirs if fresh storms occur. “Reservoirs and dams are full of water after the district received extreme rainfall last week of Oct under influence of Arnab. To avoid any untoward incident, we will release water from reservoirs before fresh rain,” said an engineer, water resources department.The district administration has also warned fishermen not to venture to the sea and return to respective villages before Monday, as the sea might get rough to very rough during the period.The district administration also cancelled leaves of govt officials and asked them to remain at their respective workplaces till further orders.