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On duty to check stubble burning, farmers hold 2 officials ‘hostage’ in Bathinda
Terming the incident of holding officials hostage in Bathinda as unacceptable, deputy commissioner Showkat Ahmad Parray said he has conveyed the incident to the state authorities for initiating further action.
A team of Bathinda district officials, including a woman, was held hostage by the activists of the Bhartiya Kisan Union (Ekta Sidhupur) for three hours after the former visited Nahinawala village to inspect an incident of paddy stubble on Sunday.
The district administration had to send police personnel to release patwaris Munish Bansal (revenue department) and Deepika, an employee of water resources.
The officials on duty were made to sit in the fields till a naib tehsildar, Sukhdev Singh arrived on spot to rescue the officials.
BKU activists led by their leaders Ranjit Singh Jeeda and Kulwant Singh said farmers would launch an agitation if the district authorities try to take any action for burning crop residue.
The activists confirmed that a farmer, Naib Singh, burnt organic waste after harvesting paddy. They said if the state government does not grant farmers an incentive of ₹6,000 per acre for stubble management, paddy growers will have no option but to burn the organic waste.
Terming the incident of holding officials hostage as unacceptable, deputy commissioner Showkat Ahmad Parray said he has conveyed the incident to the state authorities for initiating further action.
“The administration was alerted about a farm fire incident on Saturday evening. A team sent today for the field inspection confirmed the fire event. Burning of crop waste is against the rules. Instead of availing stubble management facilities provided by the administration, unions are supporting illegal and hazardous activities of burning stubble,” said the DC.
36 fire events in southwest Punjab
Farmers of southwest districts of Punjab caused 36 events of paddy stubble burning on Sunday.
According to Punjab Remote Sensing data, a total of 206 cases of farm fire were reported today across Punjab with Ferozepur reporting 19 fire incidents, the third highest today in the state.
On Sunday, except Bathinda, all six districts of south Malwa recorded fire cases.
In Moga seven cases were reported on Sunday followed by Fazilka (6), Mansa (4) and Faridkot (2).
To date, 1,444 farm fire events have been recorded with Tarn Taran continuing to lead with 73 incidents followed by Amritsar where the farm fire was reported on 39 sites today.
