Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday demanded that the Punjab Government should immediately withdraw the cases lodged against thousands of farmers across the State in connection with the burning paddy straw. “The Government needs to understand in the first place the nitty-gritty of the malaise leaving the harried farmers to resorting to burn paddy straw…They were forced to take this anti-environmental step due to anti-farmer stance of the State and the Central Governments,” said AAP MLAs — party’s state Kisan wing president Kultar Singh Sandhwan and party spokesperson Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer.
Had the governments provided the necessary financial assistance and machinery to dispose of the straw as per the guidelines of the National Green Tribunal (NGT), they would not have to resort to burn the farm dust, they said.
Sandhwan said that unless and until the government did not fix bonus for Rs 200 per quintal on the minimum support price (MSP) to disposal of the paddy straw, there would be no solution to the problem.
He said that the farmers were left to bear the whopping cost of Rs 6,000 to 7,000 per acre, which, he said, was beyond the financial reach of common farmer already fighting the financial difficulties.
