June 11 (Punjab Khabarnama) : To prevent the water level from going down further, paddy sowing work will start today in five districts Muktsar, Bathinda, Mansa, Fazilka and Ferozepur apart from Faridkot, for which all arrangements have been made. At the same time, CM Mann has appealed to the farmers to use canal water as much as possible.
Giving information about the arrangements made for sowing the crop, Dr. Chief Agriculture Officer Amrik Singh said that paddy cultivation will be done in about one lakh fifteen thousand hectares of area in Faridkot district. He said that the Water Resources Department of the Punjab Government has also made arrangements for water in the canals, which will reach the villages in a day or two. He said that sufficient stock of fertilizers, urea, dye, potash and herbicides etc. required for the cultivation of the jowar crop is also available in the district and there will be no shortage of it.
Sharing technical points related to paddy cultivation, he said that before transplantation, the fields should be leveled with the help of computer so that the water for irrigation can be uniform. He said that fertilizers should be used in paddy crop only as per the recommendation given in the soil testing report.
He said that in the absence of soil testing report, if fertilizer has been applied fully in wheat crop, then there is no need to apply fertilizer in paddy crop. He said that 90 kg urea should be applied in three equal installments at 7, 21 and 42 days after sowing and PR 126 should be applied 35 days after the third installment. He said that while planting saplings in the field to get higher yield, the age of saplings should be 30-35 days for medium duration varieties like PR 126 and 25-30 days for short duration varieties.
