India's central government is creating a 12-digit Unique Farmer ID for every farmer so that state benefits reach genuine growers, Ei Samay reports. Work has recently begun in several blocks of Bhangar in West Bengal, and is under way in blocks of Nadia, North 24 Parganas and Murshidabad.
The problem is an old one: some people are alleged to hide information and draw money meant for farmers, leaving genuine farmers out. Under the central Digital Agriculture Mission, each farmer's identity, land and crop details are being recorded in a government digital system called AgriStack, so that entering the ID shows officials the farmer's full record.
How it works: before registration, land revenue officials check the deeds, record-of-rights and other documents the farmer submits. Farmers can register at the agriculture office or online. Sahanur Rahman, assistant director of agriculture for Bhangar-I block, said the ID is mandatory for farmers.
Agriculture officials say a digital identity will make it easier to send money from schemes such as Krishak Bandhu and PM-KISAN, subsidies, crop insurance, farm loans and payments for crops bought at the minimum support price directly to genuine farmers' bank accounts. Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat and other states are well advanced; West Bengal has more than 10 million registered farmers, and the state's new government has launched a new farmer registration portal.
Applications for subsidies on farm machinery are open online from 6 October to 4 November. Baharul Islam, agriculture chief of the South 24 Parganas zilla parishad, said the department will check that no genuine farmer is excluded because of discrepancies in land records or technical problems. The report is by Prasanta Ghosh, Ei Samay's Bhangar correspondent.
Photo: Frank Bond / Wikimedia Commons (public domain); farmers in a Bengal rice field, for illustration
Source: Ei Samay
Comments
(0)