111 farmers fined for burning stubble

Tribune News Service

Nitin Jain

Ludhiana, November 3

Cracking the whip against the age-old menace of stubble burning, the administration has fined and blacklisted 111 farmers so far for putting their paddy straw to the flames during the current Kharif season in the district, the government has confirmed.

The environment compensation of Rs 2.33 lakh has been slapped on the violators for at least 560 farm fires spotted across 2,56,900 hectares of area under paddy cultivation, which is the maximum in the state, the officials have revealed.

With the stubble burning cases rising, the air quality in Ludhiana on Friday again remained poor with a thick blanket of smog enveloping the state’s biggest and largest district, in terms of area and population. The smog blanket reduced the visibility considerably, especially during the morning and evening hours, making it difficult for commuters to drive and residents gasping for fresh air.

Deputy Commissioner Surabhi Malik told The Tribune that a two-pronged strategy comprising awareness and enforcement was underway to check the burning of crop residue in the district.

She said the district administration in association with the Agriculture Department and other allied departments had been spearheading a sustained campaign to sensitise peasants against stubble burning. “The drive has evoked a massive response with a large number of the farmers saying no to burning of crop residue but habitual offenders are dealt with sternly to motivate those adopting scientific management of stubble,” Surabhi said.

The DC said 111 farmers were caught burning stubble following which Rs 2.33 lakh environmental compensation was imposed on them. Of them, nine violators were blacklisted by making red entries in their revenue records. However, environmental compensation was yet to be imposed in seven cases.

She shared that as many as 1,658 crop residue management machines were made available, of which 933 were delivered during the current season, to the farmers across the district to scientifically manage paddy straw.

“We have been felicitating the farmers for saying no to stubble burning while more will be honoured in future as well to motivate more peasants for scientific management of paddy straw,” she added.

Meanwhile, there is no let-up in the stubble burning cases as 560 cases of crop residue burning were spotted by the Punjab Remote Sensing Centre (PRSC) here till November 3. However, it was almost half than 1,025 farm fires reported during the corresponding period in 2022 and 1,134 in 2021.

On Friday, 59 fresh cases of farm fires were recorded, which were the tenth highest daily count in the state while Thursday’s tally of 80 was the highest daily count reported in the district this season so far. Still, the daily count was almost 40 per cent of 198 crop residue burning cases captured in the district on November 2 last year and 186 recorded on that day in 2021.

However, the experts have expressed apprehensions over the current season’s farm fire data in view of the fact that almost 65 to 70 per cent of the total paddy crop had already been harvested in the district till date.

“When we look at the previous crop patterns, the 2,56,900 hectares of area under paddy is estimated to produce 18.5 lakh metric tonnes (LMT) of crop, which will leave behind 1.7 LMT of straw in the fields,” an agriculture expert, Dr Amanjit Singh, who had recently retired as Chief Agricultural Officer, said.

On the air pollution front, Ludhiana, however, remained the state’s second least polluted city on Friday with air quality index (AQI) of 238, which was considered “poor”, with the prominent pollutant PM2.5 concentration 160µg/m³, which was 33 times the World Health Organisation (WHO) annual air quality guideline value, causing breathing discomfort to the people with lungs, asthma and heart diseases.

While Bathinda remained the most polluted city in Punjab with AQI of 353, Patiala turned out to be the safest with AQI 237. Among other four cities monitored by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Amritsar recorded AQI of 238, Jalandhar 275, Khanna 247 and Mandi Gobindgarh reported the AQI of 276 at 7 pm on Friday.

“While the poor air quality causes breathing discomfort to most people on prolonged exposure, the very poor AQI leads to respiratory illness and allied complications,” opined an expert, Dr Ranjana Agrawal, while adding that the influx of such patients had been on the rise for the past few days.

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#Agriculture #Environment #Farm Fires #Pollution #Stubble Burning