NEW DELHI, May 14: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday released the eighth instalment of financial benefits worth Rs 19,000 crore under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme to benefit more than 9.5 crore farmers that includes first-time beneficiaries in West Bengal.
The Prime Minister released the instalment through video conferencing, saying “farmers in West Bengal for the first time benefitted with the Central scheme and that more farmers will get the support as soon as the Centre receives it”.
The instalment will enable the transfer of more than Rs 19,000 crore to over 9.5 crore beneficiary farmer families.
Modi also interacted with farmer beneficiaries during the event and said that around Rs 1.35 lakh crore has been transferred to the bank accounts of farmers under the PM-KISAN and Rs 60,000 crore during the Covid-19 pandemic.
So far this year, the Prime Minister said that “about 10 per cent more wheat has been purchased at Minimum Support Price (MSP) as compared to last year”.
“So far, about 58,000 crore of wheat procurement has reached the farmers’ account directly”.
Under the PM-KISAN scheme, a financial benefit of Rs 6,000 per year is provided to the eligible beneficiary farmer families, payable in three equal 4-monthly instalments of Rs 2,000 each.
The fund is transferred directly to the bank accounts of the beneficiaries.
In this scheme, Samman Rashi of over Rs 1.15 lakh crore has been transferred to farmers’ families so far.