Punjab govt to allow farmers to sell sand deposited in fields, says Sisodia
The Punjab government will soon bring a policy allowing farmers in flood-affected areas to remove and sell the sand deposited on their fields by floodwaters, AAP’s Punjab affairs in-charge Manish Sisodia announced on Sunday
Chandigarh : The Punjab government will soon bring a policy allowing farmers in flood-affected areas to remove and sell the sand deposited on their fields by floodwaters, AAP’s Punjab affairs in-charge Manish Sisodia announced on Sunday.
Addressing a press conference here, Sisodia said the unprecedented floods have not only destroyed the kharif crop of farmers in the state but also got them worried about the upcoming rabi season crops, as vast amounts of silt and sand deposited on their agricultural fields. “There has been massive devastation and this urgent policy will provide a big relief to farmers by ensuring that agricultural activities resume without delay,” said the AAP leader after touring several flood-hit districts.
Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Ferozepur, Kapurthala, and Fazilka are the worst-affeted districts where large swathes of farmland remain under water.
Sisodia said chief minister Bhagwant Mann had received similar feedback during his visits to flood-affected areas. He said the CM had already discussed this issue with officials and assured that a clear policy would be announced within the next few days to enable farmers to extract sand from their fields without any bureaucratic hurdles.
The AAP state in-charge had met Mann at Mohali’s Fortis Hospital, where the CM was admitted on Friday evening due to exhaustion and a low heart rate.
AAP state president and cabinet minister Aman Arora also said that the government would soon take this big decision shortly to provide relief to farmers. “We have received feedback that farmers are seeking permission to remove sand from their floods,” he said. AAP MP Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal made an appeal to the government to bring a ‘jiska khet, uski ret’ (the sand belongs to the landowner) policy for flood-affected areas, allowing farmers to sell it.
Responding to a media query on the Centre’s response to the floods, Sisodia said that while Prime Minister Narendra Modi, home minister Amit Shah and other senior leaders spoke to the chief minister, no concrete financial assistance had been announced so far. “Punjab’s rightful dues of over ₹60,000, including goods and services tax dues and rural development allocations, are pending with the Centre. I urged the Prime Minister to release these dues before his visit,” he added. He also criticised Union agriculture minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan over his remarks linking illegal mining to the floods in Punjab, remarking that the statement reflected the minister’s mindset.
