LAHORE, June 16: Various farmers’ bodies criticized on Monday the government’s decision to impose flat rate of abiana in the province.
“This a ploy to trap the government and farmers,” alleged Hamid Malhi of the Punjab Water Council and the Farmers’ Associates Pakistan.
“It will benefit neither the government nor the farmer. The government should have realized that the real problem is the corruption in the collection system, and not the abyana’s amount,” he said. He added that from 1981 to 1998, the government had increased service charges by 166 per cent, but its collection increased by only 66 per cent. Of late, it was dropped to 40 per cent only.”
“Historically, the government has been able to recover only 20 per cent of the arrears. Although the farmers have paid every penny, nearly Rs4 billion are yet to be recovered as arrears. This shows that the ‘corrupt collection mafia’ has pocketed the amount,” he said.
He claimed that instead of refining the collection process, the government had chosen to change the billing procedure.
According to an agriculture chamber official, the bureaucrats had misled the government. By imposing flat rate of the entire irrigated area, the department would be able to show the theoretical economic potential of the sector and get more loans from the donors. But it would not recover anything from farmers because the system had yet to be changed.
An Agriculture Justice Movement official claimed that the farmers, under the previous system, used to pay according to the crop sown by them. Now they would be made to pay for the total ownership, he added.
“There is another side to the story,” a Kissan Board member said. He added: “All the 34,000 water courses in province have different ground realities. Upper riverians get full water while the tail-enders get nothing. How can they be charged the same rate? he questioned. “One must keep in mind that abyana is only a service charge, not the price of water. If one does not get the service, how can he be charged?
“The government has not increased the amount of abyana since 1998, but now it is out to enhance it,” said a farmer. “It is like imposing the GST,” he added.
He said the Punjab Irrigation and Drainage Authority conducted a so-called survey, but the project was finalized by the department’s power wing. “If the farmers’ fate can be left to the power experts, one can only pray for the farmers in the Punjab,” he claimed.