Water woes flowed into Punjab Vidhan Sabha on Monday during the ongoing monsoon session with the lawmakers, cutting across party lines, putting their heads together to resolve agricultural-related issues cropping out of water shortage.
As the MLAs from all political parties exchanged their views on various aspects of water problem confronting Punjab, the Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh announced to soon convene an all-party meeting to discuss the matter.
Capt Amarinder, responding to a query raised by Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Kotkapura MLA Kultar Singh Sandhwan during the Question Hour on advancing paddy transplantation date, categorically made it clear that there was “no possibility of advancing the dates from June 20”.
Highlighting the “serious” water problem Punjab is facing, Capt Amarinder announced that soon, an all-party meeting would be convened to formulate a comprehensive strategy “by discussing not only the depleting ground water level, but also the cropping pattern, irrigation techniques, and to take all precautions after taking everyone’s opinion on how to save Punjab”.
Sandhwan was demanding to advance the paddy transplantation dates to June 5 or 10 citing that “short duration between two crops compels the farmers to indulge in burning their paddy residue”.
“Advancing the date even by 10-15 days would, at least to some extent, resolve the problem of pollution from paddy burning,” he added.
Capt Amarinder, categorically declining the demand, said that considering the predictions that Punjab may turn into desert in the next 10-15 years, “what we would give to our next generation. It is our responsibility to give a better Punjab”.
“June is a dry month. The demand for power increases, there is more need for pumping and water...so there is no possibility of advancing it,” he said.
He said that the transplantation date had been advanced to June 13 this year “only on experimental basis” and there was no proposal under the State Government’s consideration for permanently altering the date of transplantation of paddy.
Maintaining that 85 percent of Punjab is in “critical zone”, Capt Amarinder said that the state’s river water, which was 17.1 MAF at the time of evaluation by the Eradi Commission, has now gone down to just 13 MAF, and “the problem is aggravating with the melting of glaciers coupled with the greenhouse effect”.
The Chief Minister cited the Dynamic Ground Water Estimation Report-2017 report, published in 2019, to observe that the number of blocks falling under over-exploited category, where groundwater abstraction exceeds recharge, stood at 109 out of the 138 study blocks in the state. The average yearly rate of fall of water level is about 50 cm per year, he added.
Capt Amarinder said that Punjab Agriculture University (PAU) is making efforts in this direction. “PAU has introduced five new varieties which take fewer more days to mature and require lesser irrigation against the long-duration varieties of paddy sown in Punjab,” he said, adding that it needs 90 to 117 days.
PAU has introduced new paddy varieties like PR 126, PR 124, PR 127, PR 121 and PR 122, which were now being sown in 83 percent of the area and were maturing, on an average, in 110 days, he said, adding that efforts are on to market these varieties more and more.
Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) MLA from Sanaur Harinderpal Singh Chandumajra pointed at the need to improve the irrigation and canal network in the state to save ground water instead of pushing back the paddy transplantation dates.
“Irrigation needs special attention and it has even less than Rs 100 crore budget. Due to short time between two crops, several problems like labour shortage, high prices for labour, high moisture content in paddy, after which we have to seek relaxations from the Centre,” pointed Chandumajra while insisting that the paddy transplantation should be done as per earlier dates.
Intervening, Lok Insaaf Party (LIP) MLA Simarjeet Singh Bains asked the Government to act upon the resolution, seeking royalty from Rajasthan, passed by the Vidhan Sabha and send bills to neighbouring state for using Punjab’s water.
“Will the government send bills to the Rajasthan as per the resolution passed by the House or will it stop water to Rajasthan to maintain water level in the state,” Simarjeet asked the Chief Minister, adding that more than Rs 16 lakh crore are pending towards Rajasthan.
At the same time, Congress MLA Rana Gurjeet Singh, who was the former water resources minister in the current government, insisted on giving a “viable” suggestion that “is in the Punjab’s interest” which would resolve the water problem, but the Speaker Rana KP Singh did not allow him to speak.