Two farmers booked for burning paddy stubble

Amritsar, October 27

A case under Section 188 was registered against two farmers Jaswant Singh and Hardeep Singh, both residents of Khasa village, for the violation of Section 144 imposed by Deputy Commissioner for not burning paddy stubble today. It was the first case registered for burning crop residue in the district. After receiving inputs from the Punjab Remote Sensing Centre, a joint team of the Agriculture Department and the police visited the spot and confirmed that the paddy straw was set on fire on an area of 4.5 to 5 acres.

Our teams visited 834 places after getting information about farm fires out of which in 334 cases, Rs 8.37 lakh has been charged as environmental compensation from the violators. Jatinder Singh Gill, Chief Agriculture Officer

In the absence of any economical alternative for the disposal of paddy stubble, the farmers do not refrain from burning it. Farmers argue that the measures offered at the government level were practically unviable and put extra financial burden on them. They demanded that a policy should be made by the government to start a scheme to lift crop residue from fields so that it can be used as raw material in the industry.

Chief Agriculture Officer Jatinder Singh Gill said till date, their teams visited 834 places after getting information about farm fires out of which in 334 cases, Rs 8.37 lakh was charged as environmental compensation (EC) from the violators.

He said the government was offering subsidy on five kinds of machines available for cutting paddy straw. These machines were Zero Till Drill, Happy Seeder, Super Seeder, PAU Smart Seeder and Surface Seeder.

A farmer was given 50 per cent subsidy on the purchase of any one of the machine. Besides panchayat, cooperative society, farmer producer organisation and farmer groups get 80 per cent subsidy for purchasing machines.

Cost of Zero Till Drill machine in the market was Rs 60,000 to Rs 70,000, Happy Seeder Rs 70,000, Super Seeder 2.65 lakh to Rs 2.8 lakh and Surface Seeder (PAU) Rs 80,000 to Rs 1 lakh.

Super Seeder was the most sought after machine as it mixed paddy straw in the soil while sprinkling manure and seeds of wheat, besides cutting the crop residue. The Agriculture Department had approved 1,067 applications to buy 1,281 machines this season. As many as 559 machines had been procured till now.