Punjab: 122 stubble burning incidents on Sunday mark highest single-day spike this season

Punjab witnessed 743 stubble burning incidents from September 15 till October 26, with 122 cases on Sunday marking the highest single-day spike this season, official data showed.

Tarn Taran and Amritsar districts contributed the bulk of cases, according to Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB) data, as many farmers continued to disregard the state government's appeal to stop crop residue burning.

The state has seen a sharp jump in stubble-burning cases in the past week, from 353 cases recorded till October 20 to 390, the data showed.

According to the data, the highest farm fire incidents were reported from Tarn Taran at 224, followed by Amritsar 154, Ferozepur 80, Sangrur 47, Patiala 39, Gurdaspur 38, and Kapurthala 29.

Stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana is often blamed for the rise in air pollution in Delhi-NCR. As the window for the Rabi crop, wheat, is very short after paddy harvest in October-November, some farmers set their fields on fire to quickly clear off crop residues.

According to PPCB data, the total area under paddy cultivation in Punjab this year is 31.72 lakh hectares. Till October 26, 56.50 per cent of this area had been harvested.

Fines amounting to Rs 16.80 lakh have been imposed as environmental compensation in 329 cases so far, of which Rs 12 lakh has been collected, according to the PPCB.

The data also showed that 266 FIRs have been registered against farm fire incidents during this period under Section 223 (disobedience of order promulgated by public servant) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).

State authorities have also marked 296 ‘red’ entries, including 108 in Tarn Taran and 68 in Amritsar, in land records of farmers who burnt crop residues. A red entry bars the farmers from getting loans against their farmland or selling it.

Pathankot and Rupnagar districts have not reported any stubble-burning incidents so far, followed by SBS Nagar (2), Hoshiarpur (3), Malerkotla (4), Barnala (6), Moga (8), Ludhiana (8), and Mansa (8), according to the data.

Punjab saw 10,909 farm fires in 2024 as compared to 36,663 in 2023, marking a 70 per cent drop. The state recorded 49,922 farm fire events in 2022, 71,304 in 2021, 76,590 in 2020, 55,210 in 2019 and 50,590 in 2018, with many districts, including Sangrur, Mansa, Bathinda and Amritsar, reporting a large number of stubble-burning incidents.