PM-Kisan Scheme: More than 81,000 farmers in Bihar have been declared ineligible for the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) scheme, and government authorities have instructed state-owned banks to expedite the process of recovering funds from them.
A senior official disclosed that these farmers were disqualified from the central government program for various reasons, including paying income tax.
After a thorough review, a total of 81,595 farmers were identified as ineligible beneficiaries in Bihar. This number comprises 45,879 individuals who have been paying income tax since 2020 and an additional 35,716 who were disqualified for other reasons.
Alok Ranjan Ghosh, the Director of Agriculture in the state, stated that the agriculture department has instructed all relevant banks to hasten the collection of refund amounts, which total approximately Rs 81.6 crore, from these farmers.
During a recent meeting of the State Level Bankers' Committee (SLBC), senior officials were directed to prioritize the collection process. Lenders were also instructed to issue fresh reminders to ineligible farmers if necessary and freeze their accounts.
As of now, certain banks have managed to collect roughly Rs 10.3 crore in refund money from these ineligible farmers, according to Ghosh.
The PM-Kisan scheme was initiated on December 1, 2018. Under this program, an annual income support of Rs 6,000 is provided in three equal installments to all farmer families who own land.
State governments are responsible for identifying eligible farmer families based on the scheme's guidelines, and the funds are directly transferred to the beneficiaries' bank accounts.
In summary, over 81,000 farmers in Bihar have been found ineligible for the PM-Kisan scheme due to reasons such as paying income tax. The government has urged banks to expedite the collection of around Rs 81.6 crore in refund amounts from these farmers, with some progress already made in this effort. The PM-Kisan scheme offers crucial financial support to land-owning farmer families across India.
