Troubles continue with PM-Kisan Samman Nidhi Scheme. As farmers await their payments through the scheme for over a year. Out of the Rs 20,000 crore allocated in 2018-19 there is till payment of Rs 12000 crores pending. In addition, Rs 75000 crore allocated for FY 2019-20 may not be fully utilised.
Vivek Aggarwal, Agricultural ministry stated that under the scheme total amount spent for FY 2019-20 estimated at Rs 50,000 crores. There are various issues of database and farmer identification due to which there is non-allocation of balance Rs 25000 Crore.
Lack of Data Base
The scheme was hurriedly announced right ahead of the 2018 elections and then the government did not have proper database of farmers. Mr Agarwal said that the farmer families might be less than 14.5 crore. He pointed out that many states like West Bengal, have delayed or did not submit the data related to farmers.
Difficulty in Identifying Beneficiary Farmers
According to agricultural census of 2015-16, number of landholdings in the country was projected at Rs 14.65 crore. But land holding do not determine the number of farmer families present in the country as there are multiple owners for a single land. In such scenario, all the farmer families which own the land are eligible for the scheme.
Number of landholdings in Punjab according to agricultural census were 10.39 lakh but number of beneficiaries farmers in PM-kisan data base list were 17.52 lakh till October 23, 2019.
It may also happen that a single farmer holds multiple lands. The agricultural census may record multiple land holdings which PM-Kisan scheme would otherwise recognise as single farmer.
Census Issue
Other problem include the agricultural census that counts the number of operational landholdings. Which is the piece of land being used for cultivation without considering the title of land. Whereas PM-kisan scheme considers the farmer families recognised as land holders under the state or union territory.
Further, around 14.3 crore landless farmers (census 2011) will not be able to avail this scheme. Mainly due to the fact they are not the land holders and are contract farmers.
However, the government is trying to release fund to farmers by linking their account to Adhaar card. Government extended the date to seed the adhaar account to November 30 2019.
It also launched an official website. Through the website farmers can register for the scheme and they can get the update of their subsidy status online. It also helps farmers to know the reason for not crediting their subsidy so that they can rectify the same.