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The Centre on Tuesday extended the deadline for farmers to enrol in the flagship crop insurance scheme - Prime Minister Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) - after some States requested an extension due to delay in finalisation of the insurance companies. The cut-off date, which expired on July 31, has now been extended till Ausugst 16. The extension may help more farmers in getting added to the scheme, particularly those who take loans from banks.
According to the approval of the Agriculture Ministry, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Goa and Manipur have got 15-16 days more time after the cut-off date expired. But, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan have received approval for up to August 10 and Odisha and Assam up to August 5.
Maharashtra has been given three days extension and Karnataka one day after the deadline, officials said, adding these are mainly for procedural issues. “The extension has been given as per request received from States and insurance companies have also no objection,” an official said.
No extension
However, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Jammu and Kashmir and Puducherry have not got extension after July 31 since they had already been given 15 days extra time from the original deadline of July 15, the officials said.
Though complete loanee farmers’ data who have enrolled under the PMFBY are yet to be received from banks, the non-loanee farmers’ interest in the crop insurance scheme has increased in spite of the normal monsoon predicted for 2023, sources said.
Until July 31, as many as 2.04 crore non-loanee farmers’ applications for enrollment have been received whereas in the kharif 2022 season, their number was 1.46 crore, up by 40 per cent. The insured area of non-loanee farmers in kharif 2023 has reached 11 million hectares (mh) against 6.82 mh in kharif 2022, up by 61 per cent.
“There has been an encouraging report of enrollment through the mobile app which began from July 1 as a pilot before being rolled out formally on July 21,” an official said. A total of 1.88 lakh applications have been received for coverage of nearly 1 lakh hectare and all are from non-loanee farmers. Two years back, the government had made PMFBY scheme voluntary as banks used to get loanee farmers compulsorily enrolled so that their farm loans get secured.
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