Blog

Know, which insurance scheme is operated in which state: Although the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana of the Central Government is said to be like a security cover for the farmers, due to this scheme being voluntary, many states are providing the benefits of these schemes to the farmers by implementing their own separate scheme instead of this scheme.

These states are raising questions on the Prime Minister’s crop insurance scheme: Let us inform that many states have raised questions regarding the Prime Minister’s Fasal Bima Yojana (PM Fasal Yojana) of the Central Government, while the Central Government has been telling this scheme as a security cover for the farmers. At the same time, the farmers are also made aware of its benefits. Meanwhile, after Gujarat and Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, and West Bengal have also turned their back on PM Fasal Bima Yojana.

Punjab was not already involved in this scheme. At the same time, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has also put a question mark on this scheme. On the other hand, the Maharashtra government is also warning that if the Center does not make necessary amendments in the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana in time, then they will also be out of this scheme.

Central government claims, farmers got more claims: If the central government is to be believed, under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, from 2016-17 to 2020-21, farmers paid Rs 21,550 crore to insurance companies as their share premium in PM crop insurance, while in return the farmers were paid Rs. Till the end, a claim of Rs 1,11,066 crore has been received. At the same time, questions have often been raised in Parliament that the insurance companies are running arbitrarily in the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana and huge premiums are charged from the farmers.

Companies got so much premium: Let us tell you that in the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PM Fasal Yojana), these three farmers, the state, and the Center together pay the premium to the insurance companies. The share of farmers is very less. Most of the share is given by the central and state governments. This money also belongs to the taxpayers. Therefore, it does not seem logical to count only the pocket money of the farmers as the premium received by the insurance companies.

Overall, insurance companies got Rs 1,39057 crore till 31 January 2022, i.e. crop insurance companies have earned Rs 27,991 crore in 5 years. If the state and central government together give compensation to the farmers on their crops, then such a huge amount of the government would not go.

Insurance companies benefit more: Let us inform here that the Ministry of Agriculture is bearing the burden of promoting the crop insurance scheme. For the survey of crop loss, employees of the Revenue Department are engaged whose salary comes from the government. At the same time, many insurance companies do not even have offices in the districts. In this way, the expenses of the insurance companies have not been significant, while the profit is getting about Rs 5598 crore every year. The arbitrariness of insurance companies is such that despite paying premiums many times and crop loss, farmers do not get compensation.

This is the alleged arbitrariness of insurance companies: Regarding the alleged arbitrariness of insurance companies in the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, agriculture expert Vinod Anand says that in case of damage to crops due to natural calamity, samples should be taken from every field, whereas this does not happen. In light, the damage is fixed by picking up a sample of crop damage from only 2 places.

A light usually covers 1500 hectares of land. In this way, companies calculate the loss by considering the entire light as a unit while the premium is paid by each farmer separately. In this case, each farm should be considered as a unit.

Know the truth of crop insurance: Complaints about farmers’ problems due to the arbitrariness of insurance companies often come through the news. These companies make rounds of farmers for compensation. Sometimes due to underestimation of damage and sometimes due to other conditions, even the incidents of stubble burning are being monitored by satellite.

The government is getting the details of the field where the stubble is burning, but the satellite is not used for crop damage. The farmer first gives this information to the insurance company in 72 hours. After that, the employees of the Revenue Department come and conduct the survey. If the information is not given within 72 hours, then the farmer concerned is deprived of the claim. In such a situation, many states are not participating in this scheme and running their own insurance scheme.

Unique insurance scheme of the Haryana government: Let us inform you that the Haryana State Government has taken an important decision regarding the premium of the crop insurance scheme. Under this, the state government will pay the premium for the share of the tenants cultivating less than two acres of land, while the state government will bear half of the insurance premium for the farmers having land between two to five acres.

This decision of the Haryana government will increase the pressure on those states whose share of premium subsidy is not paying claims to the farmers despite the loss of insurance companies due to arrears.

This is the stand of the Maharashtra government: The Maharashtra government has a different stand on the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana. While presenting the Maharashtra budget, Maharashtra Finance Minister Ajit Panwar said that Gujarat and some other states have already opted out of the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, the Maharashtra government is demanding the Prime Minister to amend the scheme. If this demand is not accepted, then the government can consider other options of giving compensation to the farmers.

This is the side of the central government: Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar says that PM Fasal Bima Yojana is voluntary for all states. States are free to subscribe under the scheme considering their own risk. Coming to the Kharif season 2016, since the inception of the scheme, so far 27 states have implemented the crop insurance scheme in one or more seasons. Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Telangana, Jharkhand, West Bengal, and Gujarat have opted out of the scheme after implementing it for a few seasons.

Separate insurance schemes in Kerala and Goa also: Let us inform you that the state governments of Kerala and Goa have operated their own insurance schemes for plantation crops along with the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana. State Crop Insurance Scheme in Kerala and Shetkari Aadhar Nidhi scheme is running in Goa.  

One thing that has become good in this scheme is that now the premium is not deducted from the account of the farmers without their wish, but earlier the premium of crop insurance was deducted from the account of all the farmers who had taken Kisan Credit Card.