Fixing farm insurance

PMFBY has been falling short of expectations

The woes of the government’s flagship crop insurance scheme — the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) — seem to persist despite a slew of modifications in the format since its launch in 2016. Six states have exited from it and now Maharashtra has also indicated that it might do so because the farmers are, by and large, dissatisfied with it. The leading agricultural state, Punjab, never joined it. Those that tried it and opted to quit include Gujarat and Bihar, both run by the National Democratic Alliance, besides other states like Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Jharkhand, and West Bengal. The