Plain-language explainers for central and state farm schemes — who qualifies, exactly which documents you need, how to apply online or through the CSC, and what to do when an instalment does not arrive.
Income support of ₹6,000 a year, paid in three equal instalments directly into a landholding farmer’s bank account. Most failed payments trace back to exactly three things: e-KYC not done, land records not seeded, or an Aadhaar-name mismatch with the bank.
Benefit: ₹6,000 / year
Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana caps the farmer’s premium at 2% for kharif, 1.5% for rabi and 5% for commercial crops. The clause that decides most claims is the 72-hour one: a localised loss must be intimated within 72 hours of the event.
Farmer premium (kharif): 2% of sum insured
The cheapest institutional credit available to a farmer. At 7% headline, with a 3% prompt-repayment incentive, the effective rate on repaid-on-time borrowing falls to 4% — well below any informal lender.
Headline interest: 7% p.a. (with interest subvention)
A free soil test report with crop-wise fertiliser recommendations. Acting on the card typically cuts urea use by 8–10% with no yield penalty, because most Indian soils are short of potash and sulphur, not nitrogen.
Cost to farmer: Free
A voluntary pension of ₹3,000/month from age 60, for small and marginal farmers who pay in ₹55–₹200 a month between 18 and 40 — matched rupee-for-rupee by the government. Unlike PM-KISAN, this is contributory: you fund roughly half the pension yourself.
Pension: ₹3,000/month from age 60
Cluster-based assistance to convert to certified organic farming — a group of 20+ farmers on 20 hectares gets support for inputs, PGS-India peer certification and marketing over 3 years. Recent PIB figures put per-hectare assistance at ₹31,500 over that period.
Assistance: ₹31,500/hectare over 3 years
A ₹1 lakh crore loan facility — not a grant — for warehouses, cold storage and other post-harvest infrastructure. The Centre pays 3% interest subvention and a collateral-free credit guarantee on loans up to ₹2 crore; PACS, FPOs, cooperatives and entrepreneurs are the usual applicants.
Facility size: ₹1 lakh crore
The umbrella irrigation scheme behind "Har Khet Ko Pani". For an individual farmer, the part that matters is Per Drop More Crop — a 55% (small/marginal) or 45% (other farmers) capital subsidy on drip and sprinkler systems, capped at 5 hectares.
Micro-irrigation subsidy: 55% (small/marginal) · 45% (others)
Solar energy for farmers in three parts: subsidised standalone solar pumps up to 7.5 HP, solarising an existing grid-connected pump, and setting up a small solar plant on barren land to sell power to the DISCOM. Subsidy is typically 30% central + 30% state, farmer pays the rest.
Component B (pumps): Standalone solar pumps up to 7.5 HP
Not a scheme a farmer applies to directly — it puts agri-drones in the hands of Women Self Help Groups, at 80% subsidy up to ₹8 lakh, after 15 days of pilot training. A farmer’s role is as a customer, hiring the SHG’s drone for spraying.
Subsidy: 80% of drone cost, up to ₹8 lakh
A national electronic trading platform networking mandis so a farmer isn’t limited to selling at the local market. Over 1,650 mandis and 247 commodities are on it, with online payment straight to the farmer’s bank account.
Mandis linked: 1,656 across 23 states + 4 UTs
Capital subsidy for fisheries and aquaculture — ponds, hatcheries, cage culture, fishing vessels, cold chain — typically 40% of project cost for general beneficiaries and 60% for SC/ST/women. Applied for through the State Fisheries Department with a project report.
Capital subsidy: 40% general · 60% SC/ST/women
A 3% interest subvention on a bank loan of up to 90% of project cost, for setting up a dairy processing unit, a meat processing unit, or an animal feed plant. Applied for via the Udyami Mitra portal.
Interest subvention: 3% for all eligible entities
A 50% back-ended capital subsidy for rural poultry, sheep/goat, piggery and feed-fodder entrepreneurship units — up to ₹25 lakh for poultry, ₹50 lakh for sheep/goat or feed-fodder, ₹30 lakh for piggery. Applied for via the NLM Udyami Mitra portal.
Entrepreneurship subsidy: 50% capital subsidy, back-ended
Boosts production of rice, wheat, pulses, millets and commercial crops — not through cash, but free seed minikits, subsidised certified seed and cluster demonstrations, delivered when your district is picked under the state’s annual plan.
Crops covered: Rice, wheat, pulses, millets, cotton, jute, sugarcane
Articles
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Central Government SchemesFarm loans are easier to get than most personal credit for one structural reason — priority sector lending. Here is what that means in practice, and what a bank actually needs from you before it lends.
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Central Government SchemesBoundary disputes rarely start with bad intentions — they start with a decades-old map, a missing stone marker, and two neighbours each certain they are right. Here is how official demarcation actually works.
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Central Government SchemesA season budget answers whether this crop will make money. Financial planning answers a bigger question — what happens to the family if it does not, and what the farm looks like in ten years rather than one.
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Central Government SchemesKCC covers the crop season. For everything else — a solar pump, a cold store, a dairy processing unit — a separate set of government-backed loan schemes exists, each with its own subsidy and interest structure.
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Central Government SchemesA bigha in Uttar Pradesh is not a bigha in Rajasthan, and a rough pace-count is not a survey. Here is what your land record actually measures in, how it gets measured, and how to convert it to a unit you can compare.
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Central Government SchemesThe gap between when input costs go out and when harvest revenue comes in is where most farm financial stress actually lives. Selling in tranches, pledging stored grain, and staggering crops all shrink that gap.
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Central Government SchemesAgricultural or non-agricultural, irrigated or unirrigated, cultivable or fallow — the classification sitting quietly in your Khasra decides your tax treatment, your scheme eligibility, and what you are legally allowed to build.
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Central Government SchemesEvery scheme payment, loan and land sale in India traces back to one document — the Record of Rights. It goes by a different name in every state. Here is what each record actually is, and where to check yours online.
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Central Government SchemesAlmost every failed PM-KISAN payment comes down to one of four fixable problems — e-KYC, land seeding, an Aadhaar-name mismatch, or an ineligibility flag. Here is how to identify which one is yours and fix it.
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Central Government SchemesThe KCC is the cheapest money a farmer can borrow — but only if you repay within the year. Miss that date and the interest subvention vanishes, and the rate you actually pay nearly doubles.
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