Contrary to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's plans of interlinking the rivers of Punjab and repairing the dams, Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today said there is no need of repairing the dams as the government is taking care of the its maintenance.
Modi, at a function in Hussainiwala on the the occasion of martyrs had suggested that rivers should be linked and old canals to be repaired.
"Rivers should be linked and old canals will be repaired," he had told farmers at the function organised to pay homage to martyrs Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru on March 23.
However, Badal today said state government had already constructed dams over its rivers -- Sutlej, Beas and Ravi and as on today there was hardly any river which was un-tapped.
"Our state is already water deficit and the inter linking of rivers in the state is a distant reality," Badal said on the sidelines of the 11th death anniversary of late SGPC chief Gurcharan Singh Tohra here,.
On the support given by the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) to the NDA's Land Acquisition Bill, Badal clarified that "We have asked the Centre to make the clause of farmer's consent prior to their land acquisition mandatory beside to give them solatium at the rate of 30 per cent as compensation allowance for their displacement and rehabilitation by allotting residential and commercial property through land pooling scheme as being done in Punjab."
On seeking adequate compensation from the Centre for the crop loss due to untimely rains and hailstorm across the state, he said that the norms of centre in this regard were too meager, too insufficient and too little to compensate the farmers since the Congress regime and now the NDA government has been requested to revise these norms suitably to make the loss suffered by the farmers.
Badal said that his government had already pleaded to introduce a Crop Insurance scheme so that the entire damage caused to their standing crops could be adequately compensated.
The Centre was merely paying Rs 3600 per acre as compensation to the farmers and state was giving Rs 1400 from its own resources to make it Rs 5000 per acre, he said.
