ROURKELA: The agriculture authorities have strengthened monitoring to expedite the slow pace of registration for PM-Kisan and CM-Kisan schemes in the tribal-dominated Sundargarh district.
The fresh registration process for PM-Kisan scheme was initiated from February to get a sanitised list of farmers and to create authentic database of beneficiaries with scrutiny of documents and other relevant records. After registration of farmers, the data for PM-Kisan would be utilised for the CM-Kisan scheme, earlier called KALIA yojana under the previous BJD government in the state.
Sources in the Agriculture department said so far, the district has managed to complete registration of 15,291 farmers against the target of 1,90,805 farmers, which is barely eight per cent. They attributed the slow pace of registration to various reasons including the mandatory e-KYC and mismatch of information in different personal documents of farmers.
Different common services centres (CSCs) have been authorised to register the eligible farmers. However, the CSCs are not keen to expedite the process as they barely get Rs 10 remuneration for a registration. The Sahayak mode in which any individual bringing a farmer to the CSC for registration would get Rs 10 incentive, is also not working with none showing interest, said the sources.
In many cases, it is found that land records have not yet been updated after death of the heads of farming families. Farmers from such families with joint landholdings are being encouraged for partition of land to get the benefits of the scheme. In many other cases, it has been observed that mobile numbers have not yet been linked to Aadhaar cards. Besides, there are discrepancies in names or surnames in Aadhaar cards and bank accounts.
Chief District Agriculture Officer (CDAO) LB Mallick said to expedite the registration process, monitoring has been strengthened at every level. The stakeholders have been asked to show urgency in accelerating the process. Due to lack of digital literacy, the majority of the farmers are not able to go for online registration. The Krushak Sathis, village agriculture workers, overseers, block agriculture officers and assistant agriculture officers have been asked to ensure registration of eligible farmers by holding camps.
Mallick said such camps were held in Lefripada and Hemgir blocks over the past two days. Another camp was also held in Kuanrmunda block on Sunday.
According to records, the district has about 2.68 lakh farmers including about 1.28 lakh marginal farmers, 1.08 lakh small farmers, 20,200 semi-medium farmers, 10,200 medium farmers and 1,290 large farmers. Additionally, there are around 17,000 share-croppers in Sundargarh.