New Delhi. There is a ban on burning of stubble in Punjab. Along with this, under the awareness campaign, farmers are being cautioned not to burn stubble. Even after this, the incidents of stubble burning are not decreasing but are increasing. The situation is that the paddy harvesting season has just started, and till September 30, the incidents of stubble burning in Punjab are 10 times more than last year. Has increased.
Paddy is cultivated in more than 31 lakh hectares of area in Punjab, and the practice of burning stubble has put the farmers in a kind of helplessness. The Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB) has identified 16 districts and 663 villages where incidents of stubble burning are highest. This year, the Central Government has provided financial assistance for Crop Residue Management (CRM) machines to Punjab and provided 1,30,851 machines. But farmers say that their access to these machines is limited. Lakhwinder Singh, a farmer from Firozpur district, said that the benefit of subsidy on machines is not being availed properly because the dealers increase the prices in advance.
However, the central and state governments are hopeful of improvement in the pollution situation this year. They have tried to take active steps for this, but farmers say that adequate measures are still not being taken at the ground level. Pulwinder Maan, a farmer from Amritsar’s Attari village, said burning stubble has been a quick solution for him to clear fields for sowing of wheat and other Rabi crops after paddy harvesting. Mann’s fields are full of lush green crops, but the problem of stubble burning is also deep, which creates controversies in Punjab, Haryana and New Delhi. This problem of farmers shows the lack of options for them. Farmers like Pulwinder Mann are saying that they cannot take any other solution without government help. Despite the efforts of the Central and State Governments, if the problems of farmers are not addressed at the grassroots level, it is likely that the incidents of stubble burning will continue to increase this year as well, which may worsen the pollution problem.