As the harvest season of Punjab’s big Kharif crop rice is about to start out in a couple of weeks, the state government has appointed more than 8000 nodal officers across the state to stop the incidents of stubble burning. In the last couple of years, the state government appoints such nodal officials in the run up to the paddy harvest season to maintain an eye on farmers who burn stubble, the remnants of the crop, in the open which becomes a big bring about of serious air pollution in the Delhi-NCR area. On the face of it, a battery of officials appointed by the government really should be helpful in stopping all stubble burning incidents, having said that, the stubble burning incidents in the last couple of years have improved. The Indian Express reported why and how such measures prove ineffective every single year and what could be a superior resolution to finish the menace of stubble burning.
Increase in stubble burning instances
After coming to energy in the year 2017, the Congress government started appointing nodal officers to verify stubble burning from 2018. The state of Punjab consists of about 13000 villages in total and more than 9500 villages sow paddy at a massive scale. The government, as a result, has appointed about 8000 nodal officers with the ratio of one nodal officer in every single village and couple of nodal officers searching soon after two tiny neighbouring villages.
Appointment of a big posse of officials notwithstanding, the incidents of stubble burning have only improved year soon after year. In the year 2018 the state recorded a total of 50,590 incidents of stubble burning which improved to 55,210 and 76,582 in the year 2019 and 2020 respectively.
Why have nodal officials failed in stopping stubble firing incidents?
A senior nodal officer, wanting to stay anonymous, told the Indian Express that the part of nodal officers is restricted to physically verifying the incidents of stubble burning at various farms and handing it more than to the government. Putting the duties of a nodal officer on the identical pedestal to that of a postman, the official stated that nodal officers only report the incident to the government authorities and it is upto the government to take action against the farmers.
Lasting resolution for stubble burning
Experts told the Indian Express that nodal officials really should be appointed at the time of sowing of paddy crops and they really should be offered the mandate to alter the mindset of upper and middle class farmers who can afford to get stubble management machinery. The officials really should also maintain a record of tiny and marginal farmers who are sowing paddy and are not in a position to get the machinery. For such farmers, the government with the enable of NGOs really should facilitate the stubble machinery at a nominal price.
A senior official in the agriculture division told the Indian Express that there are areas in the state exactly where wealthy farmers are lending their stubble machinery to the tiny farmers free of charge of expense. The official stated that the government really should market such actions and also pitch in with free of charge diesel for these tiny and marginal farmers who can not afford it.