379 fresh farm fire cases in Punjab; maximum 66 in Sangrur district         

Punjab recorded 379 farm fires on Saturday, with Sangrur district witnessing the highest number of 66 such incidents, taking the total case count in the state past 3,900.

The state registered the current season’s biggest spike in farm fires on Friday with 587 cases. Sangrur had reported the highest number of 79 cases.

From September 15 to November 2, the state has seen 3,916 farm fire cases, according to data from the Punjab Remote Sensing Centre.

Ferozepur district reported 50 farm fires on Saturday, Tarn Taran 42, Amritsar 27, Bathinda 28, Moga 26, Patiala 21 and Kapurthala and Ludhiana 15 each.

The districts with farm-fire cases in single digits included Fazilka (one), Rupnagar (two), Hoshiarpur (two), Faridkot (six), Jalandhar (eight), Malerkotla (five), Barnala (six) and SBS Nagar (three).

Punjab reported 484 farm fires on Thursday, with Sangrur recording the highest number of 89 cases.

There has been a steep jump in the number of farm fires over the last few days.

The state recorded 219 farm fires on Tuesday, taking the season’s count on that day to 2,356.

Paddy procurement is underway in the state.

Stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana after the harvesting of the paddy crop in October-November is often blamed for the rise in air pollution levels in Delhi.

As the window for rabi crop wheat is very short after the paddy harvest, some farmers set their fields on fire to quickly clear off the crop residue for sowing the next crop.

With more than 31 lakh hectares of paddy area, Punjab produces around 180-200 lakh tonnes of paddy straw every year.

The state recorded 36,663 farm fires in 2023, registering a 26-per cent drop in such incidents compared to the previous year.

It recorded 49,922 stubble-burning incidents 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 such cases.