Stubble burning: Punjab BJP chief Kewal Singh Dhillon asks CM Bhagwant Mann where Centre’s ₹2,056 crore went

Chandigarh. Punjab BJP president Kewal Singh Dhillon on Tuesday demanded an independent audit of crop residue management (CRM) funds. He accused the Bhagwant Mann government of blaming Delhi for the smog to cover up its own failure on stubble burning.

“AAP must answer for four years of inaction instead of shifting the smog blame to Delhi,” Dhillon said. He said that more than four and a half years into its term, the Mann government had still not given farmers affordable alternatives, leaving them stranded.

Dhillon took the AAP back to November 4, 2022. That day Arvind Kejriwal, then Delhi chief minister, sat with Mann at a press conference, owned up to Punjab’s farm fires and asked for one year to end them. “Since our government is in Punjab, we are responsible for the stubble burning,” Kejriwal had said.

Four years on, Dhillon put five questions to the Mann government.

Where did ₹2,056.50 crore go?

Dhillon said the Centre had released ₹2,056.50 crore to Punjab under the CRM scheme up to 2025-26. “Where has every single rupee been spent, and how much has actually reached farmers?” he asked.

Where are the 94,456 machines?

Dhillon said the state Agriculture Department claims to have deployed 94,456 CRM machines. He asked how many of them actually work and how many Custom Hiring Centres, which rent the machines out, are running. He also asked how many marginal farmers can get a machine in the short gap between the paddy harvest and wheat sowing.

Why FIRs and red entries on farmers?

“Why slap FIRs and red entries on annadatas?” Dhillon asked, using the word for farmers as providers of food. He accused the government of booking small farmers under police sections and marking their land records to hide its own “administrative paralysis”. A red entry stops a farmer from selling or mortgaging land or taking a loan against it. He demanded that these entries be withdrawn at once.

Punjab Pollution Control Board data up to November 5 shows 2,787 farm fires this season, 710 FIRs under Section 223 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and red entries in 829 cases.

Why no cash help per acre?

Dhillon said Haryana gives its farmers ₹1,000 to ₹1,200 an acre. He asked why Punjab never paid its promised ₹2,500 an acre from its own funds, and sought practical per-acre help for farmers.

The ₹2,500 plan dates back to 2022. The Mann government proposed that the Centre pay ₹1,500 an acre and that Punjab and Delhi pay ₹500 each. The Centre turned it down, and AAP has called that refusal discrimination against Punjab.

What happened to the bio-decomposer?

Dhillon also asked about the Pusa bio-decomposer, a microbial spray meant to break down paddy straw in the field, which AAP had promoted heavily. He wants to know how many acres were sprayed, how much the state spent and what results it got.