Ludhiana: Farmers unable to avail financial aid for DSR adoption

Manav Mander

Ludhiana, June 23

In order to encourage farmers to adopt the direct seeding of rice (DSR) technique, the state government had announced financial aid of Rs 1,500 per acre. However, the growers are finding it difficult to avail this aid as they need to register themselves on an online portal, but they are not well versed with technology.

Farmers need to register themselves on the website www.agrimachinerypb.com by June 25 and amendments to this can be made by June 24. Farmers need to share the area of land on which they are practising direct seeding, which will be verified between June 26 and July 15. Two verifications will be done after which the money will be credited into their accounts.

Harjit Singh, a farmer from Akalgarh village said beyond using WhatsApp, his knowledge of internet was limited. “I asked my grandson to help me in uploading the information on the portal, but even he was unable to do so. Now, I will have to approach the agriculture officer and seek his help,” he added.

Another farmer Surjeet Singh of Dhandoli village said he was thinking of adopting DSR this year to avail some benefits but after he came to know that he would have to fill an online form, he dropped the idea. He said he could not waste time in uploading the information or pay someone to do so.

HS Lakhowal, general secretary of BKU, said Rs 1,500 per acre aid was too meagre and should be increased to at least Rs 5,000 per acre so that farmers would be encouraged to adopt DSR. “It requires a lot of hard work and famers must be incentivised to adopt this technique,” he added.

He further said uploading the information on the government portal was also a bad move as they did not have the desired knowledge.