Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, on Tuesday, kick started the ambitious drive, Direct Sowing of Rice (DSR), which promotes cultivation of paddy by using lesser amount of water from his native village Satauj.Exhorting the farmers of his native village to go for this new technique of paddy sowing in a big way , the CM said that since the residents of Punjab have given a massive mandate to form AAP Government in the state and now it was our bounden duty to take path breaking initiatives like DSR and several more for state’s overall development and prosperity, for which people’s wholehearted cooperation and support is immensely needed .Showing deep concern over the fast depleting groundwater at the alarming level, Bhagwant Mann said it is the need of hour to motivate our farmers to switch over from traditional paddy transplantation to the advanced technology of DSR.
Moreover, it is a high time to adopt an alternate technique for paddy cultivation thus saving the much scarce and precious natural resource water as almost half of the land being cultivated by the farmers and they could play a pivotal role in this regard.“To promote the DSR technology , our government has also decided to provide financial assistance of Rs. 1500 per acre to the farmers who adopt this water saving method of cultivating paddy,” CM Bhagwant Mann said.Calling upon the farmers of Satauj, Mann said that they will have to set an example for the entire Punjab by sowing paddy with DSR method on maximum area of land.To encourage crop diversification in Punjab, the CM said that their government will provide MSP on alternative crops including maize, pulse and bajra and will sell the produce of these crops on their own responsibility.
The CM also assured the farmers that during the tenure of their government, they will be getting superior quality of fertilisers, herbicides and pesticides.To ease the power supply situation in the state, Bhagwant Mann said that there will be no problem of electricity supply as their government is going to resume mining of coal from Punjab’s allotted mine in Jharkhand which was shut since 2015. He pointed out further that with un-interrupted supply of coal, there will be normal supply of power for agriculture, domestic and industrial sector, as well.On this occasion, Punjab Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema, MLA Sunam Aman Arora, DC Sangrur Jatinder Jorwal, SSP Mandeep Singh Sidhu besides CM Bhagwant Mann’s mother was also amongst several others were present on the occasion