A group of farmers, under the aegis of Harita Sena, took out a march and staged a dharna in front of the Kalpetta branch of the United India Insurance Company on Wednesday demanding the settling of insurance claim of farmers who had insured their crops under a weather-based crop insurance scheme jointly launched by the Central and the State governments through the company in Wayanad district.

Inaugurating the march, M. Surendran, president, Harita Sena, said that though many farmers in the district, especially arecanut farmers, had joined the scheme expecting that their crops would be protected against climatic vagaries and related diseases, they were yet to get the claim owing to the anti-farmer norms set by the State government.

Nominal settlementThey joined the scheme by paying Rs.2,160, including the contribution of the State government, as premium to insure areca nut crop on one acre of land, but many among them were yet to get any money, except a few who got a nominal claim of Rs.400 to Rs.2,000 an acre.

Though the farmers in the district had paid Rs.21.5 lakh as premium for the areca nut crop alone, the claim settled was below 10 per cent of it, M. Surendran said. The crop was completely destroyed in the district last year after the outbreak of nut rot disease owing to torrential rain, he added.

Mr. Surendran alleged that the governments were cheating the entire farming community through the scheme and such fraud schemes should not be executed in the district any more. If the governments failed to settle the claims, the organisation would launch a series of agitations, he added.

Source - http://www.thehindu.com/