New Delhi: Around 3.10 crore small farmers have so far received the first tranche of Rs 2,000 each under the PM-Kisan scheme and 2.10 crore peasants have got the second instalment as well, costing Rs 10,500 crore to the exchequer, a senior Agriculture Ministry official said on Tuesday.
The government had announced that 12 crore farmers would be covered under the Rs 75,000-crore Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) scheme.
Each farmer will get Rs 6,000 per year in three equal instalments. Many states have not submitted data of beneficiaries.
However, the Election Commission of India (ECI) allowed the Union Agriculture Ministry to transfer the first and second tranche of the payment to all those beneficiaries registered under the scheme before the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) that kicked in from March 10.
"About 4.76 crore farmers got registered under the PM-Kisan scheme before March 10. We have been able to disburse the first instalment to 3.10 crore farmers and the second instalment to 2.10 crore farmers so far," the ministry official told PTI.
Total Rs 10,500 crore has been disbursed so far, comprising the first and second instalments, he said.
In the budget, the NDA government allocated a sum of Rs 20,000 crore for the 2018-19 fiscal under the scheme.
The scheme was formally launched at the national level by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on February 24 at Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh by transferring the first instalment to 1.01 crore farmers, amounting Rs 2,021 crore.
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In Uttar Pradesh, the first instalment has been released to around one crore farmers so far, while in Andhra Pradesh to 30 lakh farmers.
The official further said that Punjab and Haryana are amongst the top beneficiary states as the two states have completed the registration of its farmers under the scheme.
Small and marginal farmers who hold cultivable land of up to 2 hectares are eligible under the scheme.
