Back in 1999, the government introduced the National Agriculture Insurance Scheme (NAIS) or the Rashtriya Krishi Bima Yojana (RKBY) to ensure coverage to farmer\u2019s loans and crops.
\nThe scheme did not get off to a good start, lying dormant for a long time and later on being
\nselectively employed to cater to the political motivations of some politicians. Said Bharatsinh Zala.
\nNot much seems to have changed today with the Prime Minister Fasal Bima Yojana
\n(PMFBY). Envisioned to help farmers circumvent their crop failure losses and ensure crop
\ninsurance, both State and Central Governments, as well as the many insurance companies
\nseem to be failing the countries farmers yet again and the gaping hole that is the missing
\nagriculture policy in India only seems to be getting bigger.
\nAccording to the PMFBY\u2014created in 2016 by the NDA government\u2014from the total crop
\nloan taken by farmers, a 5% premium is given to the insurance companies; 53% is given by
\nCentral & State Governments.
\nIn Gujarat, in 2017, INR 1392.70 Crore was paid to insurance companies\u2014respectively\u2014by
\nboth State and Central Government, along with the 5% premium paid by around 19 lakh
\nfarmers. Owing to massive floods in parts of Gujarat, farmers faced terrible crop losses and in
\nspite of their \u2018protection\u2019 under the scheme, only around 3 lakh farmers received
\ncompensation of INR 1042 Crores.
\nSimilarly, in 2018, Bima Companies received INR 1992 crores each from the Centre and
\nState Governments respectively along with 5% premium paid by around 21 lakh farmers who
\ntook loans. Out of this, only around 1 lakh farmers received 135 crores in compensations.
\nThe dreaded combination of this anti-farmer policy, the natural disaster calamities faced by
\nfarmers, the many\u2014high\u2014expenses borne by farmers\u2014for seeds, pesticides, weedicides,
\nmachinery; to name a few\u2014and the almost negligible return of income that farmers have to
\nbear has resulted in the sad state of affairs amongst farmers having to take care of their
\nfamilies in the state of Gujarat and many have found no other alternative than to take their
\nown lives.
\nIn the Supreme Court of India, Civil Appellate Jurisdiction, according to the Special Leave
\nPetition (C) No 29910 of 2014: CRANTI versus State of Gujarat & others, the Supreme
\nCourt order ratifies that all those farmers who take crop loans are assured under the PMFBY
\nfrom Kharif Season 2016 to receive crop insurance that covers their cost of production. But,
\nin 2017, owing to drought, they have not received crop loan waivers or insurance from Bima
\nCompanies. In 2018, 49 Talukas were declared drought afflicted by the State Government
\nowing to total crop failure. Each farmer had to spend INR 1700 per hectare\u2014not including
\nthe labour costs endured. In these trying times, without crop loan waiver, insurance
\nprotection, basic flood relief support and with impending total crop failure how will farmers
\nsurvive the challenges of the upcoming year?<\/p>\n
The State and Central Government currently give INR 6000 per every two hectares. This
\nmenial amount will not be sufficient to compensate the amount spent in buying seeds.
\nIn order to help farmers, the Supreme Court of India has ordered the Government of India,
\nState of Gujarat, the RBI and other States to come up with a strong agriculture policy. In spite
\nof this order, no policies have been created so far. The Government must look into this crisis
\nimmediately and forego crop loans, provide crop insurance to farmers and work on a holistic
\nagriculture policy at the earliest. Association with Bima Companies must be reduced to the
\nminimum.<\/p>\n
We appeal to the State and Central Governments and the Bima Companies who believe in
\ntransparency and Right to Information to reveal how much money in premium they have
\nreceived from the government, farmers and tell us all how much money was given back to
\nfarmers as insurance.<\/p>\n
Attached below is a list of 18 Bima Companies who are complicit in this agrarian crisis:
\n1. IPCO Tokyo General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n2. ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n3. HDFC \u2013 ERGO General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n4. CHOLAMANDALAM General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n5. TATA AIG General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n6. Future Janrali General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n7. Agriculture Insurance Company of India Ltd.
\n8. Reliance General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n9. Bajaj ALLIANZ General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n10. SBI General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n11. Shriram General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n12. United India General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n13. UNIVERSAL SOMPO General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n14. National Insurance Company Ltd.
\n15. Oriental Insurance Company Ltd.
\n16. New India General Insurance Company Ltd.
\n17. Royal Sundaram General Insurance Company Ltd.<\/p>\n
18. Bharti AXA General Insurance Company Ltd.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Back in 1999, the government introduced the National Agriculture Insurance Scheme (NAIS) or the Rashtriya Krishi Bima Yojana (RKBY) to ensure coverage to farmer\u2019s loans and crops. The scheme did not get off to a good start, lying dormant for a long time and later on being selectively employed to cater to the political motivations […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[54,7],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paUKPQ-2bX","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8429"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8429"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8430,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8429\/revisions\/8430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/allgujaratnews.in\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}