I-T payers, pensioners, landless pocketed Rs 42 crore: CAG report

Tribune News Service

Bhartesh Singh Thakur

Chandigarh, March 24

The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has found that income tax (I-T) payers, state government pensioners, deceased farmers and those who don’t own land pocketed benefits under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) scheme worth over Rs 42 crore.

Ineligible beneficiaries

An amount of Rs 40.70 crore has been released to ineligible and income tax payees, out of which only Rs 4.60 lakh has been recovered and an amount of Rs 40.65 crore is to be recovered, says Comptroller and Auditor General.

The CAG’s report was tabled before the Vidhan Sabha on March 22.

The PM-Kisan scheme was launched in February 2019 and aims to provide income support and risk mitigation to farmers. Under the scheme, income support of Rs 6,000 per annum is provided to all eligible farmers’ families across the country with specified exclusions in three equal instalments of Rs 2,000 each every four months.

For the audit, seven districts, 14 blocks (two blocks from each selected district) and 84 villages (six villages from each selected block) were randomly selected out of 22 districts, 140 blocks and 7,356 villages of Haryana. The audit was conducted in 2021.

Due to improper identification, non-verification and lapses in the monitoring of the PM-Kisan scheme, benefits amounting to Rs 1.31 crore were disbursed to the state government pensioners, says CAG. These beneficiaries belonged to group C and above category. The audit has recommended the recovery of this amount.

As on June 1, 2021, the audit noticed that 3,131 ineligible farmers had received 16,802 instalments of Rs 2,000 each, amounting to Rs 3.36 crore. Out of these, only 51 farmers had refunded 207 instalments amounting to Rs 4.14 lakh.

Similarly, 38,109 income tax payees covered under this scheme had received 1,86,677 instalments of Rs 2,000 each, amounting to Rs 37.34 crore. Only four farmers had refunded 23 instalments, amounting to Rs 0.46 lakh. “Thus, an amount of Rs 40.70 crore has been released to ineligible and income tax payees, out of which only Rs 4.60 lakh has been recovered and an amount of Rs 40.65 crore is yet to be recovered,” says CAG.

In reply, the Agriculture Department stated on December 15, 2021, that Rs 23.94 lakh had been recovered from 246 ineligible beneficiaries and Rs 138.02 lakh recovered from 1,455 income tax payee beneficiaries. Thirty-nine beneficiaries took benefits of Rs 4.48 lakh along with their spouse/minor children against the rules.

There were 19 beneficiaries who didn’t own the land, but received benefits of Rs 2.82 lakh. The audit identified 66 deceased beneficiaries too.

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