Hindustan Times

The Punjab and Haryana governments on Friday presented their respective budgets for 2020-21 with key focus on education and agriculture.

Presenting a Rs 1.54 lakh crore budget, Punjab finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal made a raft of announcements, including free education for all up to class 12, implementation of 6th pay commission, release of dearness allowance arrears and loan waiver for landless and farm workers, despite rising debt.

The Hindu

The State government is struggling hard to cope with the farmers’ demand for procurement of redgram under the price support scheme at the minimum support price of ₹5,800 per quintal this year with the targeted quantity on behalf of National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation (Nafed) has already been procured.

The Hindu

The Risota or Risotto, a northern Italian rice variety, is being cultivated in organic method by one Basetti China Gangadhar under the guidance of the progressive farmer Nagula Gangaram popularly known as Chinni Krishnudu, at Gutpa village in Makloor mandal.

“It is not cultivated anywhere in the country and we are raising it here as a challenge. The interesting thing is that we raised the nursery using rice grain and not paddy seed. Chief executive officer of Gajanan Rice Mills, Hithin Bhimani, brought one kg risota rice from an international rice exhibition held in Cologne in Germany. With which we raised the nursery and transplanted in a 60 square yards,” said Mr. Chinni Krishnudu.

The Hans India

Deputy Chief Minister Pilli Subhash Chandra Bose said that farmers should adopt modern technology to get better yield. Speaking at Acharya N G Ranga Agriculture University (ANGRAU), Peddapuram, Bose said that nearly 67 per cent of rural population were depend on agriculture sector in the country.

He said that if one wishes to shine in agriculture sector, they could take the help of agriculture scientists.

Indian Express

In the fourth budget of Congress’s government, for the first time, the much-needed diversification got a small push when Punjab Finance minister has proposed Rs 200 crore support to boost crop diversification against the allocation of Rs 60.49 crore in the last budget. But farmers’ and agriculture experts said that these allocations were just budgetary provisions, with actual realisation a distant dream.

Punjab has also set aside Rs 2,000 crore for crop loan waiver, including Rs 520 crore for farm labourers and landless farmers. Experts said that the amount was too little.

Tribune India

Heavy rain along with hailstorm and strong winds lashed the region on Saturday, flattening wheat crop.

There are reports of flattening of wheat, which had just started developing grain, along with waterlogging of ready-to-harvest fields of potato crop. The wheat crop on land along the Jalandhar-Hoshiarpur road near Adampur fell flat. Similar reports were received from Patara, Johalan, Hazara, Nangal Shama, Puranpur and Talhan villages on this side.

Times Of India

The Punjab government has allocated Rs 12,526 crore for the agriculture and allied sector in the 2020-21 budget. Of this, Rs 2,000 crore will be used for the next phase of crop loan waiver. The amount includes Rs 520 crore for waiver of loans taken by landless and farm workers. Two new agricultural colleges will be set up at Gurdaspur and Balachaur (Nawanshahr) with the initial allocation of Rs 14 crore. Also, Rs 8,275 crore has been earmarked for free power to farmers.