Punjab set to roll out its own crop insurance scheme shortly

CHANDIGARH: Having rejected the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojna (PMFBY), Punjab is set to have a ‘tailor-made’ crop insurance policy of its own, removing most of Punjab’s key objections to the central scheme.
Where the agriculture department, in collaboration with the farmers’ commission has been working on a framework, a UN accredited agency too has proposed a model that seeks to remove most of the inherent shortcoming of the scheme offered by the Centre.A final decision would be taken only after a formal presentation to chief minister Amarinder Singh.
Balwinder Singh Sidhu, Punjab’s agriculture commissioner, told TOI that the new scheme is on its way and the draft would soon be put up before the committee constituted by the state government. “It is a tricky task to fix parameters such as the rate of reinsurance so that the policy is competitive enough, but a concerted effort is being made in the interest of farmers,” said Sidhu, who is also the member-secretary of Punjab State Farmers’ Commission (PSFC).
Meanwhile, sources said there are indications that the state government might even jump on the PMFBY bandwagon if some of its key concerns are addressed. At a recent meeting of NITI Aayog, the Centre hinted at making changes in the concepts of the scheme such as removing Punjab’s primary objection pertaining to irrigated and non-irrigated areas being clubbed together.
There is talk that the proposed policy could have a mix of indemnity and indexed claims to offer more flexible parameters whereby proxy methods are used to assess incurred crop losses or claims are settled based on actual crop losses. To rule out delays due to unavailability of data, there are plans to go in for integration of the government data sources such as land records, digitized revenue records with data from bank accounts as well as insurance policies.
Earlier this year, Punjab had opted out of the PMFBY citing conditions like 40% crop damage, 10-year benchmark for assessing normal yield level while deciding on the insurance premium. Besides, the crop affected while lying in the market yard is not covered under the scheme. Under PMFBY, the state and the Centre pay 49% each as premium while the rest 2% is paid by the farmers.
BKU (Rajewal) president Balbir Singh Rajewal endorsed Punjab’s decision not to accept Centre’s crop insurance policy. “Some of the conditions are unacceptable and during our meetings with teams from the Government of India, the farmers’ concerns were duly pointed out,” he said.
“When the crop is being insured with one acre as unit, how can the claims be connected to the entire village? Some years back people in our village took loan for livestock, which came with a mandatory insurance policy. If the animal died, there was no one to guide them about post-mortem and they ended up losing out on claims,” said Ranjit Singh, a farmer from Bahadurgarh in Patiala.
What adds to the plight of farmers is that under the present schemes, they do not get a copy of the policy to file an appeal, say farmers.
Corporate adviser Jagjit Singh Kochar said in a state like Punjab where such a large area was under agriculture, there was a pressing need to have an ‘automated’ crop insurance policy that is designed for the benefit of farmers.
PSFC chairperson Ajay Vir Jakhar was not available for comments.