Chandigarh, June 10 -- The cotton cultivation in Punjab during the current kharif season has witnessed a 20% increase, taking the area under cotton from 2.49 lakh acres last year to 2.98 lakh acres this year, an increase of over 49,000 acres. Punjab minister of agriculture and farmers welfare Gurmeet Singh Khudian informed this on Monday.

Chairing a meeting to review the ongoing kharif season and departmental projects here, Khudian said Fazilka district leads in cotton cultivation with 60,121 hectares, followed by Mansa (27,621 hectares), Bathinda (17,080 hectares) and Muktsar (13,240 hectares).

The agriculture minister said that the Punjab government would provide a 33% subsidy on cotton seeds to growers with over 49,000 farmers having...