DigiClaim under PMFBY [UPSC Notes]

In March 2023, the Government launched a DigiClaim platform for the settlement of crop insurance claims under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY). In this article, you can read all about this new platform and its benefits. This is an important topic for the IAS exam under polity and governance.

DigiClaim PMFBY

DigiClaim is a digitalised claim settlement module under PMFBY which will help farmers receive the disbursed amount electronically to their accounts.

• Importance:
  • It will help farmers receive their claims digitally, in a faster, time-bound and automated manner.
  • Farmers will be able to track the claim settlement process on a real-time basis on their mobile phones.
  • It is expected to bring the claim reversal ratio down.
• For the operational part, the National Crop Insurance Portal (NCIP) was integrated with the Public Finance Management System (PFMS).
• It has been operationalised in 6 states (Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand and Haryana).
  • The Centre is in discussion with all the states who exited from this scheme (PMFBY) and many are already willing to join it back (such as Telangana and Jharkhand); discussion with others is going on and some others have not committed as they are implementing their own crop insurance scheme in the states.

Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY)

• Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana is the flagship scheme of the government for agricultural insurance in India in line with the One Nation-One Scheme theme.
  • Crops covered under this scheme: Annual Commercial/Annual Horticultural crops, oilseeds, and food crops (Cereals, Millets, and Pulses).

Read more on the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana in the linked article.

Issues with PMFBY:

• Delay: there have been several instances of delay in settling the claim of the insured farmers due to multiple reasons such as:
  • Delayed release of the share of the premium by states to insurance companies. 
  • No adherence to meet stipulated deadlines in crop-cutting experiments is one of the reasons for this delay.
  • Delay in uploading yield data onto the crop insurance portal.

DigiClaim under PMFBY:- Download PDF Here