MP farmers file Rs 3,000 cr insurance claims

Though state chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has a long pending demand to revise National Agriculture Insurance Scheme (NAIS), soyabean farmers in Madhya Pradesh have presented never-before claims to the tune of Rs 3000 crore approximately.

 

“These claims of nearly Rs 3000 crore are the highest ever since 1999 or during the last 27 rabi seasons, when the scheme was launched in the state,” a highly placed official in department of farmers’ welfare and agriculture development told Business Standard.

 

Heavy rains have put soyabean crop under losses in forty districts this khariff season. Those districts where farmers have claimed more than Rs 100 crore are Dewas (Rs 180 crore), Harda (Rs 243 crore), Hoshanbagad, Rs (375 crore), Raisen (Rs 471 crore), Rajgarh (Rs 193 crore), Sagar (Rs 170 crore), Sehore  (Rs 450 crore), Shajapur (Rs 130 crore) and Ujjain (Rs 156 core).  As many as 2.4 million farmers have presented their claims against losses. 

 

State chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had recently pressed for his demand cover all farmers as a unit under various crop insurance schemes in view of the frequent spells of unfavourable weather. The rabi crop losses this season have been reported in approximately 10000 villages and the total losses according to state government have reached Rs 13000 crore. 

 

State government has put the loss figures of Rs 5723 crore from Central government and has made provisions of Rs 2000 crore for immediate relief to farmers by prune budgets of other departments.

 

Chouhan had on July 19, 2006, decided to treat “patwari halka” as the unit for crop insurance in Madhya Pradesh. Till then, tehsil was considered the unit for calculating crop damage due to adverse weather conditions.

 

The Central government had left it on state government  to adopt Patwari Halka as unit for crop insurance. Members of Parliament from Madhya Pradesh had also raised the issue and lobbied support at the Central Government level.

 

Central Government’s sanctioned for declaring ‘patwari halka’ on 25 June 2006. As many as 11,524 ‘patwari halkas’ are in the state and treated as units for extending the crop insurance benefit to farmers.

 

In 2011, the as many as 35,00,000 hectare of Rabi crop had been affected due to frost-like conditions. The state government has made arrangements of Rs 700 crore then and had reportedly disbursed Rs 353 crore. The crop losses had been estimated at Rs 7,624 crore.