Categories: Goverment Schemes

Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bhima Yojana

Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bhima Yojana was launched on 18 February 2016 by the honorable Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Its been almost five successful years of its launch. It was launched on an idea on the One Nation – One scheme, involving two previous schemes – National Agricultural Insurance scheme and Modified NAIS.

Table of Contents hide

1 Main Objectives Of PMFBY:

2 Eligibility :

3 How to report the loss?

4 Benefits of the PMFBY Scheme:

5 Insurance Companies incorporated with the scheme:

6 To know more:

7 Related Articles

Controlled and maintained by the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare.

Main Objectives Of PMFBY:

Providing insurance to the notified crops.
Allowing income through insurance in case of loss of crop through natural calamities etc., helps farmers in the continuance of farming.
Helping the farmers to develop innovative and modern agricultural methods
The flow of credit to the farming sector is maintained through this scheme.

AIM:

The scheme aims to reduce the premium insurance burden of the crop on the farmer and allow the complete claim for the insured money/amount.

Who can and How can they apply?

All farmers growing the notified crops at notified areas with an insurable interest in the crops can apply.

Eligibility :

All farmers have a Crop Loan account whose credit limit is sanctioned/ renewed.
The government decides few farmers on a timely basis.

Note: Voluntary coverage can be done to all the farmers if the crop loan account is not renewed.

All the eligible farmers or the farmers growing the notified crops can apply through the following link directly.

Link to apply: https://pmfby.gov.in/

Also, the soil and area should be tested for the quality and calculate the profits of the crop in the land by applying through the CCE App directly, where the Crop Cutting Experiment is done, and statistics are noted.

How to report the loss?

Farmers can report the loss of crop within 72 hours through the app or directly inform the agricultural officer nearby and claim the benefit of the loss electronically into their bank accounts.

Benefits of the PMFBY Scheme:

All the eligible farmers must pay a uniform premium of 2% for Karif Crops and 1.5% for Rabi Crops, and 5% for horticulture / commercial crops. The rest of the premium is paid by the government.
The farmers can claim the 100% subsidy in case of any loss occurs to the crop and is fully paid without any deductions by the government.
Modern technologies and agricultural methods are highly encouraged. Remote Sensing will reduce the multiple Crop Cutting Experiments over the land.
PMFBY replaces all previous apps of the government to reduce the Service tax Liability of the services involved.

Insurance Companies incorporated with the scheme:

The Department of Agriculture Corporation and Farmers Welfare have designated the Agriculture Insurance company of India.

The designated Agriculture Insurance companies allied with this scheme are

Agriculture Insurance Company of India Limited.
ICICI- Lombard General Insurance Company Ltd.
HDFC- ERGO General Insurance Company Ltd.
IFFCO- Tokio General Insurance Company Ltd.
Cholamandalam MS General Insurance Company Ltd.
Bajaj Allianz General Insurance Company Ltd.
Reliance General Insurance Company Ltd.
TATA – AIG General Insurance Company Ltd.
SBI – General Insurance Company Ltd.
Universal Sompa General Insurance Company Ltd.

Calendar of Activity:

The Loaning period of the Karif crop is from April to July of every year and needs cut-off for the yield data is a month.
The loaning period of the Rabi crop is from 31 July every month and needs a cut-off for the yield data is a month.

Problems:

Following the guidelines of the PMFBY, Modi has targetted the margin of 50% of targetted crops to be enrolled. Due to “Lack of faith” in the previous schemes, they found that the enrollment would reduce, and there is a huge spike in the enrollment target, which was then estimated to reach 98 million hectares by 2018-2019.

The main problem with the scheme and rise of the “Lack of Faith” concept is that the crops that underwent natural, unexpected calamities enrolled under the scheme remained unpaid. The claim status of the damaged crop is still pending due to the fail of record, and also the Insurance formalities and procedures were opted by Private Companies; both the government and farmers pay the premium to the private companies that delayed the claiming process, rejecting the loss and also failed to settle down the insured amount to the farmers during the then last two farms (Rabi and Karif) as targetted till 2018-2019. Where the calculated outstanding due reportedly counts more than Rs 2829 crores.