Crops damaged due to unseasonal rain, waiting for reports from states: Narendra Singh Tomar

He also said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi would release Rs 16,000 crore under the PM-KISAN scheme as the 12th instalment during the ‘PM Kisan Samman Sammelan 2022’ — a two-day event in New Delhi that Modi is scheduled to inaugurate on Monday.

So far, the government has transferred over Rs 2 lakh crore to “eligible farmer families” under PM-KISAN. “Of this, Rs 1.6 lakh crore has been transferred during the Covid pandemic period,” the Agriculture Ministry said in a statement.

With the 12th instalment, the ministry said, the total amount transferred to beneficiaries is expected to cross Rs 2.16 lakh crore.

The scheme was announced in February 2019 in the Budget. The first instalment was for December 2018-March 2019 period. The fund is transferred directly to the bank accounts of beneficiaries.

Tomar said the Prime Minister will also inaugurate 600 PM Kisan Samriddhi Kendras (PM-KSK), which come under the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers. He will also launch Bharat Urea Bags, as part of the government’s One Nation One Fertilizer Scheme, Tomar said.

According to the Agriculture Ministry, “It is proposed to convert 3,30,499 retail fertilizer shops into PM-KSK.”

The ministry said more than one crore farmers will virtually join the PM Kisan Samman Sammelan 2022. “732 Krishi Vigyan Kendras (KVKs), 75 ICAR Institutes, 75 State Agricultural Universities, 600 PM Kisan Centres, 50,000 Primary Agricultural Cooperative Societies, and 2 lakh Community Service Centers (CSCs) will also attend the event virtually,” the ministry’s statement said.

During the event, Modi will also launch Indian Edge, a weekly international fertilizer e-magazine, the statement said.

Later in on Saturday, Tomar and Minister of State for Agriculture, Kailash Choudhary, visited a paddy field at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), Pusa, New Delhi.

“They reviewed the disease resistant varieties of basmati rice being grown by DSR (direct sowing of rice) method such as the Pusa Basmati 1979, made by improving the Pusa Basmati 1121, and Pusa Basmati 1985, derived by improving Pusa Basmati 1509,” the Agriculture Ministry said in a separate statement.

“These varieties will help in increasing the income of the farmers and saving water by reducing the cost of paddy cultivation by direct sowing. They also inspected an advanced line of coarse rice, an improved high yielding variety of Pusa 44, and commended the work being done by the Pusa Institute. Besides, they also observed three varieties, resistant to scorch and blight disease of Basmati rice, – the Pusa Basmati 1847 which is an improvement of Pusa Basmati 1509, Pusa Basmati 1885 which is an improvement of Pusa Basmati 1121 and Pusa Basmati 1886 which is an improved form of Pusa 1401,” the statement said.