A farmer from Talwandi Bhangeria, who had installed a meter on water pumps irrigating the fields while sowing paddy using direct sowing technique has saved at least 62 lakh litres of water.A team from Jal Shakti Abhiyan led by PK Mishra, Director, Financial Intelligence Unit, Government of India on Wednesday, visited the Talwandi Bhangeria village to inspect the fields of Progressive farmer Baldev Singh. As per the information, Baldev Singh had sown paddy on six acres with direct sowing technique and six acres with the traditional flooding the fields with water technique for experiment and had installed a meter on water pumps irrigating fields to calculate the water usage by both techniques.Jaswinder Singh Brar, Plant Protection Officer, who was accompanying the team said that when they compared water usage after two months found that the farmer has saved at least 62 lakh litres of water using direct sowing technique.
The farmer told the visiting team that he was practising the new technique for the past couple of years and he has not only saved water but also found that he saved around Rs 1100 per acre on power consumption.Brar said that the paddy fields with direct sowing method require irrigation once a week while traditional irrigation method requires to water fields at least two times in a week.Director PK Mishra commended the farmer for his exemplary work and appealed all the farmers in Punjab to do away with traditional technique instead use direct sowing technique to save maximum water as it is need of the hour.Meanwhile, Dr Kuldeep Singh, XEN Panchayati Raj Dr Rajesh Kansal, XEN Water supply and sanitation JS Chahal, Dr Rajwinder Singh, Dr Swaranjit Singh, Dr Dhawan and Dr Balwinder Singh among others were present during the visit.