Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN)

• 24th February 2020 is the 1st anniversary of the starting of a new Central Sector Scheme, namely, the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN).
• The scheme is effective from 1.12.2018.

• Prime Minister had launched the scheme on 24th February 2019 at Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh.

• To provide an assured income support to the small and marginal farmers, the Government has launched the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN).
• The scheme aims to supplement the financial needs of the farmers in procuring various inputs to ensure proper crop health and appropriate yields, commensurate with the anticipated farm income.

• All land holding eligible farmer families (subject to the prevalent exclusion criteria) are to avail of the benefits under this scheme, as per the recent cabinet decision taken during May 2019.
• The revised Scheme is expected to cover around 2 crore more farmers, increasing the coverage of PM-KISAN to around 14.5 crore beneficiaries.
• Earlier, under the scheme, financial benefit has been provided to all Small and Marginal landholder farmer families with total cultivable holding upto 2 hectares with a benefit of Rs. 6000 per annum per family payable in three equal installments, every four months.

The following categories of beneficiaries of higher economic status shall not be eligible for benefit under the scheme:

• All Institutional Land holders.
• Farmer families in which one or more of its members belong to following categories:
  • Former and present holders of constitutional posts
  • Former and present Ministers/ State Ministers and former/present Members of Lok Sabha/ Rajya Sabha/ State Legislative Assemblies/ State Legislative Councils, former and present Mayors of Municipal Corporations, former and present Chairpersons of District Panchayats.
  • All serving or retired officers and employees of Central/ State Government Ministries /Offices/Departments and its field units Central or State PSEs and Attached offices /Autonomous Institutions under Government as well as regular employees of the Local Bodies (Excluding Multi-Tasking Staff /Class IV/Group D employees)
  • All superannuated/retired pensioners whose monthly pension is Rs.10,000/- or more (Excluding Multi-Tasking Staff / Class IV/Group D employees) of above category
  • All Persons who paid Income Tax in last assessment year
  • Professionals like Doctors, Engineers, Lawyers, Chartered Accountants, and Architects registered with Professional bodies and carrying out profession by undertaking practices.

• PM-KISAN would not only provide assured supplemental income to the most vulnerable farmer families, but would also meet their emergent needs especially before the harvest season.
• PM-KISAN would pave the way for the farmers to earn and live a respectable living.
• The PM-KISAN scheme aims to supplement the financial needs of the SMFs in procuring various inputs to ensure proper crop health and appropriate yields, commensurate with the anticipated farm income at the end of the each crop cycle.
• This would also protect them from falling in the clutches of moneylenders for meeting such expenses and ensure their continuance in the farming activities.

• Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) is a Central Sector scheme with 100% funding from Government of India.
• Under the Scheme an income support of Rs.6000/- per year is provided to all farmer families across the country in three equal installments of Rs.2000/- each every four months.
• This income support will be transferred directly into the bank accounts of beneficiary farmers, in three equal installments of Rs. 2,000 each.
• Definition of family for the Scheme is husband, wife and minor children.

• The States shall prepare database of eligible beneficiary landholder farmer families in the villages capturing the Name, Age, Gender, Category(SC/ST), Aadhaar Number (in case Aadhaar Number has not been issued then Aadhaar Enrollment Number together with any other prescribed documents for purposes of the identification such as Driving Licence, Voters’ ID Card, NREGA Job Card, or any other identification documents issued by Central/State/UT Governments or their authorities,etc.), Bank Account Number and the Mobile Number of the beneficiaries.
• In case of beneficiaries in States of Assam, Meghalaya, J&K where Aadhaar number has not been issued to most of the citizens, Aadhaar number shall be collected for those beneficiaries where it is available and for others alternate prescribed documents can be collected for identity verification purposes.
• Responsibility of identifying the landholder farmer family eligible for benefit under the scheme shall be of the State/UT Government.
• The Common Service Centres (CSCs) have also been authorized to do registration of the farmers for the Scheme upon payment of fees.