New Delhi: Delhi Environment Minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa, of the BJP, launched a sharp attack on Punjab's AAP government at a press conference on Tuesday, alleging that Punjab Police personnel and government officials were facilitating stubble burning at some locations while farmers were being booked for the same practice. 'In Punjab, there have been more than 1,000 incidents of stubble burning. Punjab Police and government officers are facilitating the burning of stubble. The Aam Aadmi Party is, on the one hand, getting farmers to burn stubble and, on the other hand, registering cases against them,' Sirsa alleged, according to IANS.
Source: IANS via Dailyworld
Sirsa also shared pictures which he claimed showed Punjab police setting farms on fire to worsen pollution in the national capital, saying, according to Inshorts' report of the exchange, 'They're taking revenge on the people of Delhi.' AAP rejected that claim: the party said the officials in the pictures were 'extinguishing a stubble fire' and stated, 'Sirsa, stop manufacturing lies about Punjab's farmers and police.' The allegation and the rebuttal are both claims at this stage; no inquiry finding has been reported on the pictures.
Source: Inshorts
The FIR-versus-count allegation
Sirsa said Punjab Police's own records expose the official farm-fire count. He claimed that on October 28, Tarn Taran police alone registered 90 stubble-burning FIRs, while Punjab's official count for the whole state that day was 96 farm fires, and that between October 24 and 31 Tarn Taran recorded 271 FIRs, of which 189 (about 70 percent, yaani roughly seven in every ten) were against farmers for stubble burning. 'The farmer asked for machines and support. AAP's Punjab Government gave him FIRs. If the police chased drug traffickers with the same energy, Punjab would truly be Rangla Punjab,' he said, according to the ANI report of his press release. These FIR and count comparisons are Sirsa's claims, attributed to him; the Punjab government has not been reported responding to the specific numbers in the same reports.
Source: ANI via Khelja
Citing Government of India satellite monitoring data (ICAR-IARI), Sirsa said 933 farm fires were recorded in Punjab in the seven days from October 26 to November 1, an average of 133 a day, and that on Sunday Punjab recorded 175 farm fires while Haryana recorded 7 and Uttar Pradesh and Delhi recorded none. The underlying satellite series itself is published independently: ICAR-IARI's bulletin counted 1,612 paddy residue fires in Punjab between September 15 and November 2, with 565 of them in the final three days of that period — and the same bulletins show this season's total is still lower than at the same point in any year since 2021.
Source: ICAR-IARI bulletins via NewsPlainly
Pollution board appointment and crop-residue funds
Sirsa also questioned the appointment of the Punjab Pollution Control Board (PPCB) chairperson, alleging that AAP's Delhi spokesperson Reena Gupta — whom he described as a relative of AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal and as a non-Punjabi, non-technical appointee — was put in the post to influence pollution data. That is his allegation. He further said the Centre released Rs 2,056.50 crore (yaani about Rs 2,057 crore) to Punjab under the Crop Residue Management scheme from 2018-19 to 2025-26, and Rs 430.87 crore of the Rs 592.57 crore earmarked for 2026-27 had already been released, alleging, 'Machines did not reach farmers. Advertisements did.'
Source: ANI via DailyPrabhat/Khelja
The row lands as Delhi-NCR sits under GRAP Stage II pollution curbs, with Delhi's AQI at 324 ('very poor') on November 2, and as Punjab's farm-fire season peaks ahead of the wheat-sowing window. Sirsa closed with, 'Punjab's farmers need machines, not FIRs. Delhi needs clean air, not AAP's revenge.' AAP's on-record response so far addresses the photographs; a Punjab government response to the FIR-versus-count figures had not appeared in the wire reports of the press conference at the time of publishing.