Chandigarh: Punjab BJP president Kewal Singh Dhillon on Tuesday (November 10) launched a detailed attack on the Bhagwant Mann-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government over stubble burning, posing five questions on crop residue management and demanding an immediate independent audit of the funds. Dhillon accused the government of blaming Delhi for the smog to cover up its own failure, saying AAP must answer for more than four and a half years in power instead of shifting the blame. 'AAP must answer for four years of inaction instead of shifting the smog blame to Delhi,' he said.
Source: The Punjab Standard
Dhillon took the AAP back to November 4, 2022, when Arvind Kejriwal, then Delhi's chief minister, sat with Mann at a press conference, accepted responsibility for Punjab's farm fires — 'Since our government is in Punjab, we are responsible for the stubble burning' — and asked for one year to end them. Four years on, Dhillon argued, the Mann government has still not given farmers affordable alternatives, leaving them stranded in the narrow window between the paddy harvest and wheat sowing.
Source: The Punjab Standard
The five questions
First, the money: Dhillon said the Centre had released Rs 2,056.50 crore to Punjab under the Crop Residue Management (CRM) scheme up to 2025-26, and asked where every rupee was spent and how much actually reached farmers. Second, the machines: he said the state Agriculture Department claims to have deployed 94,456 CRM machines, and asked how many actually work, how many Custom Hiring Centres — which rent the machines out — are running, and how a marginal farmer can realistically get a machine in the short gap between harvest and sowing.
Source: Nation Press
Third, the enforcement against farmers themselves: 'Why slap FIRs and red entries on annadatas?' Dhillon asked, accusing the government of booking small farmers and marking their land records to hide its own 'administrative paralysis'. A red entry in a farmer's revenue record can stop them from selling or mortgaging the land or taking a loan against it. He demanded that all such entries be withdrawn at once. The Punjab Pollution Control Board's latest report, up to November 9, records 1,442 FIRs this season.
Source: The Punjab Standard
Fourth, cash help: Dhillon said Haryana gives its farmers Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,200 an acre, and asked why Punjab never paid its proposed Rs 2,500 an acre from its own funds. The Rs 2,500 plan dates to 2022, when the Mann government proposed that the Centre pay Rs 1,500 an acre and Punjab and Delhi pay Rs 500 each; the Centre turned the proposal down, and AAP has called that refusal discrimination against Punjab. Fifth, the Pusa bio-decomposer — the microbial spray meant to break down paddy straw in the field, which AAP promoted heavily: Dhillon asked how many acres were sprayed, how much the state spent, and what measurable results it got.
Source: The Punjab Standard
What Dhillon demanded
Dhillon formally demanded three things: an immediate independent audit of the CRM machinery and scheme funds; an immediate rollback of the punitive FIRs and red entries made against farmers; and practical per-acre financial support so farmers can adopt alternatives to burning. His attack came a day after the PPCB's season tally reached 4,657 incidents, with Tarn Taran district topping the list at 659.
Source: Nation Press
The official PPCB tally Dhillon's attack builds on — 4,657 farm fires up to November 9, 1,442 FIRs and Rs 7.285 crore in fines — is reported in full here: Punjab stubble-burning tally rises to 4,657
AAP's position: no reply yet to the five questions
The AAP government had not issued a formal response to Dhillon's five specific questions at the time of reporting, both outlets noted. AAP's standing counter-line on stubble, stated a day earlier, is that the BJP targets Punjab's farmers to divert attention from Delhi's pollution. AAP Punjab media in-charge Baltej Pannu said on November 9 that Punjab has achieved nearly 90 per cent control over stubble-burning incidents this year after an 80 per cent reduction last year — figures he said are backed by the Central government's reply in Parliament — and accused BJP leaders of defaming Punjab's farmers instead of answering for Delhi's air. Those are AAP's claims, made before Dhillon's Tuesday questions, and are not a reply to them.
Source: Top Indian News (Baltej Pannu statement, Nov 9)
Stubble burning is a perennial election-season flashpoint in Punjab, and with the 2027 assembly elections approaching, the BJP — which installed Dhillon, its first Jat Sikh state president, earlier this year — is making farm fires and the CRM money a central line of attack on the Mann government. Awaaz Punjab will update this story when the Punjab government responds to the audit demand.