PM-KISAN scheme: Over Rs 164 cr recovered from fake beneficiaries
New Delhi: After facing flak over the payment of Rs 6,000 financial assistance to several lakhs of non-eligible beneficiaries of PM Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme, which is one of the largest central sector schemes, the government has claimed of making recovery to the tune of above 164 crore from fraudulent beneficiaries of the populist scheme.
In reply to a question raised by CPI member Binoy Viswam, Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar told Rajya Sabha that recoveries have been made from fraudulent beneficiaries by the state governments of Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Karnataka, and Gujarat to the tune of Rs 164.66 crore. As per the reply, highest recovery has been made by Tamil Nadu government as the DMK-ruled state has recovered Rs 163 crore from fraudulent beneficiaries. The BJP-ruled Karnataka has made a recovery of Rs 1.21 crore, while Gujarat has made a recovery of Rs 41.76 lakh and Congress-ruled Rajasthan has recovered Rs 3.6 lakh from the fraudulent beneficiaries of PM Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme.
However, the minister told the Upper House that appropriate disciplinary actions against the responsible officials have been taken by the state governments and FIRs have been lodged. "In Tamil Nadu, FIR has been filed in 16 districts and 123 persons were arrested, including contractual staff. Also, 102 contractual staff -- suspected to be directly or indirectly involved in these illegal activities – have been terminated," the minister said.
Besides, three block-level assistant directors of agriculture, where a large number of entries took place, were suspended and departmental action instituted against the 71 officers who are responsible for the enrolment of fraudulent beneficiaries in PM-KISAN scheme, he said.
In Rajasthan, a six-member enquiry committee, which was set up by the district administration, has found that the ID of the Tahasildar was misused from 192 IP addresses to make self-registered farmers eligible.
FIR has been lodged by the district administration with the list of IP addresses and disciplinary action has been instituted against the then Tahsildar and the present Tahsildar for negligence in the matter and dereliction of duty, he said, adding that Gujarat and Karnataka have also registered FIRs on respective cases.
Under the scheme, financial benefit of Rs 6,000 per year, in three equal installments, is transferred into bank accounts of farmers and till date, 11.37 crore eligible farmers have been paid more than Rs 2 lakh crore under the scheme.
Following the reporting of fraudulent activities, the Centre has reviewed the login process and implemented a robust mechanism making it mandatory to use government email id and two factor OTP authentications in mobile as well as in email apart from condition to change the password regularly, he said.
