Updated: October 14, 2020 10:25:38 am
Kejriwal said governments should stop the blame game and work together to tackle the problem of burning crop residues.
Launching the Pusa decomposer trial for stubble management on around 700 hectares of farms in Delhi, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Tuesday that smoke from agricultural fires in neighboring states has started to affect the quality of the crop. Delhi air, but that all governments were sitting with their eyes closed. Speaking in the village of Hiranki in Narela, North Delhi, where the government started spraying the mushroom-based decomposer in the fields to compost rice stubble, Kejriwal said governments should stop the game of blame and working together to tackle the problem of burning crop residues.
“In the last 10 months, the pollution was under control in Delhi, but now it has started to increase… The smoke that comes from Punjab, when it reaches Delhi, is reduced, but it is still a lot. In Punjab, in the village where a farmer is forced to burn stubble; he is forced to do it, he does not amuse himself doing it, the soil of his field is damaged by burning stubble; imagine how much pollution there would be in that town, ”Kejriwal said.
He added: “When we started this (decomposer development process), I tried to contact the central government many times. If they wanted, they could have done at least some work this year. This Pusa technology, we found out late, in September. They (the Center) knew it too. So it takes sincerity, all the agencies, all must come together and take this seriously. “
The Pusa decomposer is a mushroom-based technology developed by the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), in which seven strains of mushrooms are packaged in four capsules, at a cost of Rs 20 per pack of four. These capsules are mixed in 25 liters of water, 150 grams of brown sugar and 50 grams of besan, to develop a solution that can be sprayed on 1 hectare of field where hard stubble has been left after harvesting the variety of rice not basmati or rice paddy.
The Delhi government is making the decay solution available to farmers and is also spraying it on their fields out of their own pocket, which is costing the government around Rs 20 lakh in total.
According to IARI scientists, the solution would take about 20 days to compost the stubble. Farmers in Hiranki village, in whose field the CM started the decomposer spraying process, said they have about a month before planting wheat crops.
Sumit Rajput, 24, said: “Before we used to cut the stubble by hand and sell it as livestock feed and for other purposes. We also used to burn the stubble, which damages the soil of our field by making it hard. Last year, we flooded the field with water to dissolve the straw and that took a long time. This year, the government says that this solution would turn stubble into compost in 15-20 days. We can only wait and see. “
Prakash Singh, 60, a farmer, added: “We think this would be useful for the field, and government officials have told us that we would need to use less fertilizer if we use this solution.”
Dr. K Annapurna, head of IARI’s department of microbiology, who was on site Tuesday, said three steps are required to help break down rice straw into compost. “First the solution is sterilized, then with the help of machinery such as Rotavator, the stubble must be mixed with soil in the field. The third step is to ensure that moisture is retained in the field. If the farmer feels that the moisture content is lower, then he should irrigate the field with water, ”he said.
After 20 days, Dr. Annapurna said, the stubble seen at the top of the field would not be visible as the enzymes in the decomposer solution would help break down the straw into compost.
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