Farmers Movement Archive

Watery, itchy eyes? Blame it on farm fires

Tribune News ServiceJalandhar, November 12It’s been quite a few days when city residents are waking up to a thick blanket of smog. Driving, especially for two-wheeler riders, has become a task. Two-wheeler riders were the worst hit on Thursday, as most of them said they faced a burning sensation in their eyes.Some said their eyes had become watery after sitting out in the open for a short while.Divya Sethi, a young city woman, said: “I was out with my two friends for some work on my scooter. We went around the city just for 30 minutes in the afternoon. When we reached home, all of us felt a lot of discomfort, with our eyes getting watery for good 5-10 minutes. We got relief only after we washed our eyes.” Experts blame it largely on allergens and pollutants.As per the data of the Punjab Pollution Control Board, farm fires have been on the rise since the past three years from September 21 to November 11 (Kharif season). As per the satellite data, there were only 1,081 farm fires in 2018 in Jalandhar district. The figure jumped to 1,512 in 2019 and 1,749 this year. The data clearly shows that the attempts of the Agriculture Department and the PPCB to raise awareness against stubble burning have fallen flat so far.In Kapurthala, there were 652 farm fires in 2018, which rose to 1,333 in 2019 and further up to 1,616 this year. Even Hoshiarpur saw a steady rise from 168 incidents in 2018 to 295 in 2019 and 399 cases this year. Nawanshahr has so far been the only district of Doaba, which has seen a fall in the number of farm fire cases. There were 207 fire incidents in 2018 in Nawanshahr, which increased to 265 in 2019 and have remained low at 190 this year.Environmentalist Balbir S Seechewal said: “I fail to understand why farmers are hell bent on destroying the soil of their own fields, killing farmer friendly organisms and affecting the health of their own family and children by continuing to set their fields on fire. I also fail to understand why families are still buying crackers from the market when our whole atmosphere is getting suffocated due to smog. Why can’t people, who think they have surplus money to waste on crackers, use it for planting trees and for the welfare of needy? We have lived in a confinement for months owing to Covid. Why do farmers and others want to go into a yet another self-inflicted confinement due to pollution that, too, in the times of a pandemic?”

The Tribune

2020-11-13