india

Updated: May 31, 2019 23:59 IST

The Narendra Modi-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government unveiled on Friday pensions for small traders and farmers, and expanded PM Kisan, the minimum assured income scheme announced in its first term, to include all eligible farmers — two big-ticket announcements just a day after being sworn in for its second term.

The first meeting of the new Cabinet, chaired by Modi, decided to launch two flagship pension schemes, supported entirely by the Centre, to provide a minimum fixed pension of ₹3,000 a month for small and marginal farmers and small traders when they reach 60 years.

People between the ages of 18 and 40 are eligible for entry into the schemes.

Under the schemes, all farmers, shopkeepers and retailers, and self employed persons with a GST turnover below Rs 1.5 crore and aged between 18-40 years can enrol. According to Union agriculture minister Narendra Singh Tomar, the scheme will “benefit more than 30 million small shopkeepers and traders and secure the lives of 50 million farmers”.

The first term of the Modi-led government saw an agrarian crisis that resulted in a significant farmer movement, and also protests by small shopkeepers and traders against large multinational e-commerce firms. Many of the latter were also affected by demonetisation and the implementation of the unified goods and services tax (GST).

The Union Cabinet also cleared an expansion of the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) to allow all eligible farmers to avail benefits under this scheme.

“The revised Scheme will cover 20 million additional farmers, increasing the scheme’s coverage to around 145 million beneficiaries. The government will now spend around Rs. 87000 crores instead of the earlier estimate of 75,000 for the year 2019-20. The original scheme placed a ceiling on land holdings (2 hectares) which has now been removed.

It also decided to roll out a vaccination programme for dairy animals and pigs.

The three key announcements follow the slew of social and financial measures the Modi government announced in the run up to the general elections, including a 10% quota for economically weaker sections and the promise of zero tax burden for people with taxable income up to Rs 5 lakh.

Brushing aside the Opposition’s criticism that Rs 6000 as assured annual income is a meagre amount for farmers, Tomar countered that “those who have no knowledge about the farmers and have no link with the ground can say all these things.”

The three decisions, Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javdekar said, demonstrates that the Modi government had started delivering on its promises from day one.

“It has not even been 24 hours (since the government took office) and the first meeting has happened and decisions have been taken,” Javdekar said.

Tomar added that some states have not been able to provide the list of beneficiaries for the PM Kisan scheme as such lists were not readily available with them, but added that the government expects to receive such lists shortly and that those who missed on on the first instalment, paid out in February, would not be eligible for arrears.

The ministers also clarified that the eligibility of farmers who join the pension scheme would be decided on the basis of their land holdings. So far, according to the government data, more than 30 million farmers have received money under PM Kisan.