The Revanth Reddy government, which has already shelved the `Rythu Bharosa scheme, is now diluting `Rithy Bhima’ (farmer insurance) scheme as well. The government is not paying the insurance premium to the LIC on behalf of the farmers on time.
As the government has not yet paid the premium due in February, LIC has stopped paying compensation to the families of deceased farmers. As a result, hundreds of farmer families across the state are facing a desperate situation.
Under the Rithu Bhima scheme, the KCR government has provided free insurance to farmers aged 18 to 59. If a farmer dies for any reason, a compensation of Rs. 5 lakh will be paid to the farmer’s family. A special agreement has been made with LIC for this.
With the good intention of not burdening the farmers with the insurance premium, KCR had decided that the government will pay that amount itself. In this way, every year in August, Rs. 3,556 per farmer, amounting to about Rs. 1,400 crore, has been paid to LIC. With this, if a farmer dies, a compensation of Rs. 5 lakh would be deposited in the nominee’s account within a month.
This scheme will continue from August 15, 2018. However, after the Congress came to power, the government has been lax in paying farmers’ insurance premiums. Rs. 700 crore was to be paid in February this year under the second installment of premium.
But the government did not pay. Due to this, LIC stopped paying compensation. Due to criticism from farmers, it has been paying occasionally. It is known that up to Rs. 100 crore is still due. Due to this, LIC is stopping compensation to farmer families to this extent.
It is known that many families have not received compensation for farmers who died since February. 117 farmers have died since February this year in 27 mandals under Chevella, Shadnagar, Ibrahimpatnam, Amanagallu, Maheshwaram, Rajendranagar and Serilingampally constituencies of Rangareddy district.
The members of the respective farmer families have submitted the necessary certificates to the concerned Agriculture Department officials to get the insurance compensation. However, they have not received the insurance money yet.
When asked by the concerned Agriculture Department officials, the family members of the deceased say that nothing is pending with them and that all the documents have been sent to the relevant authorities.
It is learnt that about 100 farmers have died in Warangal districts but the respective families have not received the compensation. Thus, hundreds of farmer families across the state are facing a desperate situation due to lack of compensation.
