Chandigarh: A group of farmers allegedly forced a government official, who was part of a team to prevent farm fires, to set a heap of paddy stubble on fire in Punjab’s Bathinda district. The incident drew condemnation from Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann.
A purported video of the entire incident also surfaced on social media. Chief Minister Mann said an FIR will be lodged in the matter.
Bathinda Deputy Commissioner Showkat Ahmad Parray on Saturday said he has written to the senior superintendent of police to register an FIR against the farmers for preventing the official from discharging his duty.
The incident took place in Mehma Sarja village on Friday when a team led by a special supervisor went there to check stubble-burning incidents.
The deputy commissioner said the official was surrounded by a group of 50-60 farmers linked to a farmers’ body, who took him to a nearby field and forced him to put a heap of stubble on fire.
In the video, farmers could be heard saying that those who came to stop stubble burning were made to set the crop residue on fire.
The video also shows that the official’s hand was held by two farmers as they forced him to set the stubble on fire with a matchstick. The video was made by one of the farmers.
“When he (official) was mobbed, what option could he have? He had no choice,” DC Parray said.
The DC said that an FIR will be lodged in the matter and those who were behind the incident will be put behind bars.
“I am also visiting the village… Lawlessness is not something that we will tolerate,” said the DC.
The DC said he has already written to the Bathinda SSP, and added that the FIR will be lodged.
In a statement, Chief Minister Mann condemned the incident as an “inhuman crime” against people of the state.
He said the state government cannot be a mute spectator to this “heinous” incident and allow “anarchy” to prevail.
The government official had gone to fields to disseminate the message of not burning the paddy straw but the “mobsters” forced him to light the straw with matchstick, which is intolerable, he added.
The chief minister said such people are ruining the lives of their own children by this “dastardly” act as the smoke from these fields will make the children suffocate.
Mr Mann, while quoting ‘Gurbani’, said the verse ‘Pawan Guru, Paani Pitaah, Mata Dharat Mahat’ explains how the great Gurus equated air (pawan) with teacher, water (paani) with father and land (dharat) with mother. Unfortunately, he said this incident has reflected that the words of the great Gurus are not honoured in the state.
Mr Mann said he had asked the police to identify the “mobsters” involved in the act and book them for this “misdeed”.
This type of “chaos and sin” will not be tolerated at any cost and stern action will be taken as per the law of the land, he said.
Paddy straw burning in Punjab and Haryana is considered one of the major reasons behind the alarming spike in air pollution levels in the national capital in October and November.
As the window for wheat — a key Rabi crop — is very short after the paddy harvest, some farmers set their fields on fire to quickly clear off the crop residue for sowing of the next crop.
