Tribune News Service

Kapurthala, December 10

In a first of its kind horticulture summit, Horticulture Minister Rana Gurjeet Singh said the Punjab Government would develop the Doaba region as a potato seed hub as the soil health of this area is fully suitable for the production of world class potato seeds.

Addressing the farmers who take part in the horticulture summit on the campus of IK Gujral Punjab Technical University here, the minister said Punjab has become the first state in the country to pass the tissue-based Seed Potato Act 2021, under which the traceability and certification of potato seeds were made mandatory to ensure quality control of seeds. He also said that first time the seed cultivation of potato seeds increases to 78,000 hectare.

Talking about the newly introduced provisions in the Fruit and Nursery Act, the minister said now registration of nurseries would be a necessary step besides making tagging and traceability must.

In a conversation with the farmers, the minister also announced to set up banana ripening units. Besides that a subsidy scheme for polyhouses was also launched by the minister. In this scheme farmers would be able to attain 90 per cent subsidy to set up the polyhouses. To initiate it, 19 farmers from across the state also got work orders letters from the minister.

Terming the depletion of ground water as alarming, the minister urged the Horticulture Department and Punjab Agricultural University to develop the less water consuming varieties of crops. Director Horticulture Shalinder Kaur said the farmers must come forward for cash crops instead of traditional crop pattern to enhance their income.

Nearly 70 prominent horticulturists were also awarded by the Punjab Government on this occasion. Earlier in the technical and farmers session, prominent scientists from PAU and successful farmers in bee keeping, potato production took part in the deliberations, which mainly included Rana Inder Partap Singh, minister’s son and a sugarcane grower.

Rana’s son hogs limelight at event

• Amid the controversy over venue of the camp, the event went on smoothly. As expected, Rana's son Rana Inder Partap Singh got a good prominence at the event. He sat in the front row on the stage and later delivered a session as a leading sugarcane grower from the region
• Rana had wanted the event to be held in Sultanpur Lodhi from where his son is aspiring for Congress ticket. Sitting MLA from the holy town Navtej Cheema had, however, been outrightly opposing holding of the event there

Minister ducks query on tussle with dy cm

• Talking to the media on the sidelines of the event, Rana tried to duck down the queries related to his tussle with Deputy CM Sukhjinder Randhawa during Cabinet meeting at Chandigarh on Thursday regarding SSP appointments. He said nothing of the sort happened. Regarding his alleged grouse over no FIR over the removal of tents for the camp in Sultanpur Lodhi, he said that law would take its own course