Around 2.30 crore farmers out of a total 4.5 crore names sent by states have received the first instalment of the government's ambitious Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme so far.

The government had earmarked a budget of Rs 75,000 crore for the income support scheme in the interim budget. The cash transfer scheme proposes to pay Rs 6,000 to farmers in three instalments annually to farmers.

According to the official data, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat lead in taking benefit of PM-KISAN scheme as the three states account for around 60 per cent of farmers who received the first payment of Rs 2,000. The laggard state was Karnataka where only three farmers received the funds as on March 7.

According to the latest data, as many as 74.71 lakh farmers in Uttar Pradesh received the first instalment, while 32.15 lakh farmers in Andhra Pradesh. Around 25.58 lakh farmers in Gujarat, 11.55 lakh farmers in Maharashtra, 14.41 lakh farmers in Telangana and 14.01 lakh farmers in Tamil Nadu got the first payment.

(With inputs from PTI)

First Published:Mar 8, 2019 6:42 PM IST