PM-Kisan: 11.3 lakh fund transfers failed in four months during lockdown

NEW DELHI:  The Centre’s much-touted PM-Kisan fund saw 11.29 lakh cases of failure of fund transfer to farmers between March 23 and July 31 last year, reply to a query filed under Right to Information (RTI) Act has revealed.

The RTI reply to transparency activist Venkatesh Nayak shows the highest cases of failure of fund transfer were reported from Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Responding to the RTI plea,  Union Ministry of Agriculture also informed that nearly half (6.33 lakh) instances of failed transactions were successfully re-processed, as of July 31.

Madhya Pradesh accounted for 7.29 lakh failed transactions, followed by Maharashtra with more than 85,210 transfer failures and Karnataka, which recorded over 55,791 instances of failure of transfer of PM-Kisan funds to bank accounts during the lockdown period last year.

Bihar, with 51,004 cases of transfer failures and Uttar Pradesh with 47,918 instances were among the other states that saw very high number of failures.

These five states together accounted for almost nearly 90 per cent of the total transfer failures between March and July 31, 2020.

The ministry in its reply did not divulge the reasons why the fund transfers failed. It also did not indicate the amount of funds that could not be transferred.

It’s also not known how many beneficiaries were affected. The PM-Kisan scheme provides income support of `6,000 per annum to all eligible farmer families across the country.

The information further shows that Sikkim accounted for the lowest number of transfer failures. Other Northeastern states — Arunachal Pradesh with 141, Mizoram with 218 and Meghalaya with 233 — also reported less cases. On successful re-processing, Madhya Pradesh had the highest with 6.12 lakh cases followed by Maharashtra reporting 12,810 cases and UP reporting 1,986 cases.

SC panel begins talks with farmer organisations

The SC-appointed panel on the new agri laws on Thursday started its consultation process and interacted with 10 farmer organisations from eight states. The panel, in a statement, said the interaction was held through video conference.

Ten farmer organisations from Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharasthra, Odisha, Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh interacted with the committee members.