Amritsar, May 21

On the call of the Agriculture Technocrats Action Committee Punjab, the agriculture officials, led by its convener Kuljit Singh Saini, began a two-day pen-down on Friday.

Giving information, Dr Sukhbir Singh Sandhu, general secretary, AgTAC, said, “Punjab is a leading state in the field of agriculture since the Green Revolution.

For the last four decades the state has contributed 40 to 70 per cent of wheat and 20 to 30 per cent of the paddy in the central pool”. He said Punjab had increased the production of various cereal crops from 175 lakh tonnes to 180 lakh tonnes and paddy production from 35 lakh tonnes to 185 lakh tonnes, all due to the extension services provided by the agronomic technocrats and the farmers’ efforts.

“It has been possible only due to hard work but despite these honours, due to the apathy of the government for many years no extension workers are being recruited and no departmental promotions are being made due to which agricultural technocrats working in many posts with additional charge. They are working under mental pressure”, said Sandhu.

He said that by giving additional charge to various technocrats, the Deputy Director Agriculture cadre has been given the task of two districts, the Block Agriculture Officer has been given the job of more than two blocks and the Agriculture Development Officers have also been given additional charge. “Agriculture is currently in crisis due to difficulties in providing extension services to the farmers and the farmers are also facing many problems such as groundwater depletion, excess use of pesticides and fertilisers. The vacancies of 500 Agriculture Development Officers, 105 Agriculture Officers, 28 Deputy Director Agriculture and four posts of Joint Director Agriculture are lying vacant. He said that apart from this more than 100 vacancies in the engineering wing, Agriculture Extension Officer in the department are lying vacant. He said that 141 Agriculture Development Officers who had passed the examination through PPSC were awaiting their appointment letters.

Agriculture Officer Mandeep Kaur said during these two days of protest the agricultural technocrats didn’t do any government work but would provide all kind of services to the farmers in the offices and at the farm level. She said the AgTAC was appealing to the government to expedite the appointments and promotions keeping in view interests of the farmers.