Amidst the raging controversy over the issue of continuing instances of stubble burning in Punjab and rising pollution levels in the national capital region, including Delhi, Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Thursday insisted that the paddy straw burning is a joint issue involving several states and it should be resolved jointly.
At the same time, Mann lashed out at the Union Government for playing cheap politics by blaming the hard working and resilient farmers on the issue. “Our government had sent a detailed proposal for the resolution of the issue to the Union Government but they have blatantly rejected it,” he added.
The Chief Minister maintained that the Air Quality Index (AQI) of Faridabad and other cities of Haryana is worse than Punjab; but the Centre is putting the onus on Punjabi farmers, which reflects the anti-farmers and anti-Punjab mindset of the Union government and BJP.
“The armchair economists, sitting in air-conditioned offices at Delhi, are not giving any solution to the farmers but they are continuously bringing disgrace to them by falsely accusing them of burning the paddy. The humiliation and injustice towards Punjabi farmers is totally unwarranted and undesirable,” he said.
Meanwhile, the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Punjab on Thursday accused the BJP-led Centre of defaming the state's farmers for farm fires to divert people’s attention from the Morbi suspension bridge collapse in Gujarat.
“The BJP Government at the Centre, through the National Green Tribunal (NGT) is pressuring officers in Punjab to register cases against farmers for stubble burning,” said AAP's Punjab unit chief spokesperson Malvinder Singh Kang, adding that the BJP is trying to take revenge from farmers for forcing the Centre to repeal three farm laws.
Kang said that despite air quality in several cities of Haryana being far worse than that of places in Punjab, the BJP is consistently blaming the state's farmers for pollution.
Besides the Centre, the BJP is also in power in Haryana and poll-bound Gujarat where the bridge collapse claimed over 130 lives. “To divert the attention of the people from the issue of the Morbi bridge collapse incident, the BJP is defaming farmers of Punjab and blaming them for rising pollution,” he said.
“There has been an almost a 40 per cent reduction in the area where stubble is burnt in comparison to the previous year in Punjab,” Kang claimed, adding that this season, the stubble of 2.90 lakh hectares of the area was burnt as compared to five lakh hectares last year.
AAP leader also accused the BJP and the Centre of unleashing a slanderous campaign against farmers in Punjab by squarely blaming them for environmental hazards. “The BJP should clear its stand that why their leaders are silent over far more worst air quality in Faridabad, Manesar, Gurugram and Sonipat (Haryana), and Gwalior and Indore (Madhya Pradesh) and other states where the saffron party is in power,” he asked.
Kang said that Punjab has 31 lakh hectares of area under paddy while neighbouring Haryana has 11 lakh hectares. “This year, Punjab Government gave more than 35,000 machines (for stubble management) to farmers…As many as 1.26 lakh machines have been distributed to farmers in Punjab in the last five years,” he said.
At the same time, Kang dared Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar to tell the people what he has done to ameliorate the situation of pollution in the State and how many crop residue management machines have been distributed among farmers to tackle stubble burning cases.
Lashing out at BJP, Kang said that Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann had proposed a solution of offering a cash incentive of Rs 2,500 per acre to farmers for not burning paddy straw. However, he said that instead of accepting this proposal, the Centre had blatantly refused to bail out farmers.
AAP government had proposed that the Centre give Rs 1,500 per acre, and Delhi and Punjab governments will give Rs 500 each to farmers for stubble management.