Team News Riveting
Call it a callous attitude of West Bengal government, over 7 million farmers in the state could not get the benefits of PM Kisan Samman Nidhi.
Under the scheme, Rs 18000 crore was deposited directly in the bank account of more than 9 crore farmer families in the country today. This was the next instalment released under the scheme.
The Prime Minister expressed regret that more than 70 lakh farmers of West Bengal have not been able to get this benefit. He said over 23 lakh farmers of Bengal have applied online to take advantage of this scheme. “But the state government has stopped the verification process for so long,” Modi said.
He added the parties that do not speak in the interest of farmers in West Bengal, come here to Delhi and talk about the farmer. He said these parties are missing APMC-mandis nowadays, but these parties repeatedly forget that there are no APMC-mandis in Kerala and these people never agitate in Kerala.
The Prime Minister said that the Government aimed to open new markets for the farmers to sell their crop. He said the Government added more than a thousand agricultural mandis of the country online. Among these, more than Rs. one lakh crore have been traded. He said the Government worked towards forming groups of small farmers so that they can work as a collective force in their region. Today, a campaign is underway to form more than 10000 Farmers Producer Organizations – FPO in the country, they are being given financial help.
The Prime Minister said through these agricultural reforms better options were provided to the farmers. After these laws farmers can sell their produce to whomever they want. They can sell their produce wherever they get the right price. He said after the new laws, farmers can sell their produce at MSP or sell it at market or export or sell it to the merchant, or sell it in another state, or sell it through FPO or be part of the value chain of biscuits, chips, jam, other consumer products.
