As expected, the Narendra Modi government has introduced direct cash transfer scheme for farmers in the name of PM Kisan Yojana, which is a poor imitation of Telangana government’s Rythu Bandhu scheme.
Presenting the interim budget for 2019-2020 in Parliament on Friday, Union Minister Piyush Goyal announced the Prime Minister’s Kisan Samman Nidhi, which envisages payment of Rs 6,000 in three instalments of Rs 2,000 each.
The new scheme is nothing but a replication of the path-breaking ‘Rythu Bandhu’ scheme of the TRS government launched during last Kharif season.
However, the Modi government scheme is absolutely no match for Rythu Bandhu. The NDA scheme will be restricted to small and marginal farmers with land holdings not exceeding five acres.
And each farmer would get a lump sum amount of Rs 6,000, that too, in three instalments in a year.
However, ‘Rythu Bandhu’ scheme envisages payment of Rs 4,000 per acre per season and it is provided across the board to all farmers in the State irrespective of their land holdings.
Additionally, the Chief Minister has announced that the assistance would be increased from Rs 4,000 to Rs 5,000 per acre per season, working out to Rs 10,000 per year from this fiscal.
The Centre’s farm assistance scheme is expected to cover about 12 crore farmers across the country, while Rythu Bandhu benefitted about 58 lakh farmers in Kharif alone.
While the Centre has allocated Rs 75,000 crore for the scheme, the Telangana government is going to spend Rs 15,000 crore in the state under Rythu Bandhu.