Booked and told to pay fine for burning crop residue, Punjab farmers to protest on Nov 20

On Monday, the union leaders had gathered at Kisan Bhawan, Chandigarh, where they made this announcement. Jagjit Singh Dallewal, president of BKU Sidhupur, is leading SKM (apolitical).

Recently, BKU Sidhupur was in the news for all the wrong reasons when their members had forced a sub-divisional engineer of public works department to burn a mound of stubble lying in the fields of farmer Ram Singh in Mehma Sarja village of Bathinda. The incident took place on November 3, a video of which had gone viral on social media on November 4. Afterwards nine farmers were booked by name. Police had also booked several unknown farmers.

Speaking to The Indian Express, Sarwan Singh Pandher from Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee (KMSC) said, “This protest is not about that one case (November 3 incident) alone but in general the action being taken against the farmers for stubble burning when the government is not even providing a proper solution to the problem (farm fires). They are lodging FIRs against the farmers, imposing environmental compensation (penalty), making red entries in revenue records which could become a hurdle for farmers in getting loans from banks. There are punitive actions like cancelling of arms licences, passports, besides defaming the farmers. We strongly protest against such actions in the absence of a concrete plan to replace paddy with any other crop, or in the absence of enough residue management machines to pick paddy straw from the fields.”

Sarwan Singh Pandher is the convenor of the 18 farmer unions.

Talking to The Indian Express, Jagjit Singh Dallewal said, “The industries have all the means to manage pollution, but they pollute the air by releasing toxic fumes from factories, contaminate rivers by discharging the industrial waste into the water bodies by not using effluent treatment plants effectively. Why don’t they take such punitive actions against industrialists? Have they made any red entry in the land records of industrialists, or cancelled their passports or arms licences? Why have such double standards? Our protest at district and sub-divisional level on November 20 will be in support of all the farmers against whom such punitive action has been taken by the government.”

Moreover, farmers from all over the state are also up in arms over the Punjab government’s decision to close 510 grain mandis from Monday evening for paddy procurement. They are planning to launch a protest against the state government if the decision is not rolled back. There are more than 2,500 mandis (big markets) in the state. Farmers maintain that till the time paddy is arriving in the markets, all the mandis should remain open.

Sukhdev Singh Kokrikalan, general secretary of BKU Ugrahan, told The Indian Express, “It is an arbitrary decision of the Mandi board to announce closure of 510 mandis in different districts of Punjab when paddy procurement is still on. We will protest if this decision is not rolled back.”

Speaking to The Indian Express, Manjit Singh Dhaner, president of BKU Dakaunda (Dhaner), said, “I visited several mandis of Barnala villages on Monday where it’s been decided to close them for paddy procurement for the time being. But more arrivals are in the offing. What’s the hurry? The Mandi board needs to open all mandis for now.”

The farmer unions and SKM (apolitical) will also be protesting against this issue on November 20, Sarwan Singh Pandher added.