Which one of the following is not an objective under Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) ?

Correct — A, (a) Providing subsidies to use fertilizer, high yielding varieties (HYV) and pesticides. Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana is an irrigation and water-management mission, launched in 2015 under the twin slogans 'Har Khet Ko Pani' — water to every field — and 'More crop per drop'. Everything it sets out to do concerns water: bringing the separate irrigation programmes of different departments together at the level of the district and the field, extending assured irrigation to land that does not have it, making distribution and application more efficient, promoting micro-irrigation and other water-saving technologies, recharging aquifers, developing rainfed areas through the watershed approach and drawing private investment into precision irrigation. Options (b), (c) and (d) are three of those objectives in the scheme's own language. Option (a) describes something else entirely — the supply of subsidised inputs. Fertiliser subsidy is administered by the Department of Fertilizers through nutrient-based and urea subsidy arrangements; seed availability and improved varieties come through the seed sub-mission and the crop missions of the Department of Agriculture; plant protection has its own programmes. None of that belongs to a water mission, and PMKSY does not distribute inputs at all. The option is convincing because the combination it names — high-yielding varieties, fertiliser, pesticides and assured irrigation — is exactly the Green Revolution package of the 1960s, in which irrigation was one element of an input bundle. PMKSY takes only the water element of that bundle and organises the government's whole irrigation effort around it, and the question tests whether a candidate reads a scheme's objectives as written rather than by association with the sector it belongs to.

Why the others are wrong

• (b)To achieve convergence of investments in irrigation at the field level — This is the first objective in the scheme's own statement of purpose, and the administrative reason it exists. Before 2015 irrigation money flowed through several unconnected channels — major and medium projects under the water resources ministry, minor irrigation and micro-irrigation under agriculture, watershed development under land resources — with no single plan at the level where the water is actually used. PMKSY was designed to bring those streams together through district irrigation plans and state irrigation plans, so this is an objective rather than an exception to one.
• (c)To expand cultivable area under assured irrigation — This is 'Har Khet Ko Pani' stated plainly, and it is the scheme's headline aim. Rather less than half of India's net sown area is irrigated, and the rest depends on the monsoon, so extending assured irrigation is what the accelerated irrigation benefit component, the command area development work, the minor irrigation schemes and the restoration of traditional water bodies are all for. An objective this central cannot be the odd one out.
• (d)Improving on-farm water use efficiency — The second slogan of the scheme — 'More crop per drop' — and the objective behind its micro-irrigation component, which promotes drip and sprinkler systems and other precision methods in place of flood irrigation. Improving efficiency matters as much as adding sources, because water saved on a field already irrigated can extend supply to land that is not. It is a stated objective, not an exclusion.

Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana was launched in 2015 as an umbrella programme to give the government's irrigation spending a single frame, and it was continued for a further five-year period from 2021 with an outlay of over ninety thousand crore rupees. It works through components that remain with the departments that were already running them. The Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme, under the water resources side of the Jal Shakti ministry, funds the completion of major and medium irrigation projects that had been dragging on, some of them for decades. Har Khet Ko Pani covers surface minor irrigation, the repair, renovation and restoration of traditional water bodies, ground water development and command area development, which is the work of getting water from a canal outlet to the field. Per Drop More Crop, on the agriculture side, promotes micro-irrigation and other water-saving practices. Watershed development, under the Department of Land Resources, treats rainfed areas by soil and moisture conservation, water harvesting and drainage line treatment. Planning is meant to run upwards from district irrigation plans to state irrigation plans, with oversight from a national steering committee. The scheme sits within a wider policy setting that a candidate should be able to place beside it: a farm sector where a large share of the net sown area is unirrigated and monsoon-dependent, groundwater over-extraction in the north-west, and a separate family of schemes for income support, credit, insurance and input subsidy that PMKSY does not touch.

Key facts

• Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana was launched in 2015 as an umbrella irrigation scheme under the slogans 'Har Khet Ko Pani' and 'More crop per drop', and was continued for 2021-26.
• Its stated objectives include convergence of investments in irrigation at the field level, expanding cultivable area under assured irrigation, improving on-farm water use efficiency, enhancing aquifer recharge, developing rainfed areas through the watershed approach and attracting private investment in precision irrigation.
• It does not provide input subsidies; fertiliser subsidy, seed and planting material programmes and plant protection are separate arrangements under other departments.
• Its main components are the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme, Har Khet Ko Pani, Per Drop More Crop and watershed development.
• The Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme funds the completion of long-pending major and medium irrigation projects and is handled on the water resources side of the Jal Shakti ministry.
• Per Drop More Crop promotes micro-irrigation — drip and sprinkler systems — and other water-saving technologies.
• Watershed development under the scheme is implemented by the Department of Land Resources and treats rainfed areas through soil and moisture conservation and water harvesting.
• Planning under the scheme runs through district irrigation plans and state irrigation plans; the acronym PMKSY is also used for Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana, a food-processing scheme.

Common traps

• Reading an objective from the sector rather than from the scheme. Input subsidies are farm policy, but they are not part of an irrigation mission.
• Confusing Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana with Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana; both are abbreviated PMKSY.
• Attributing the whole scheme to one ministry. Its components sit with agriculture, jal shakti and rural development.
• Mixing the slogans of different schemes; 'Har Khet Ko Pani' and 'More crop per drop' both belong to this one.
• Assuming the scheme creates new irrigation projects only. Much of its money completes old ones and repairs existing water bodies.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The component of Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana known as 'Per Drop More Crop' is concerned mainly with which one of the following ?

  • (a)Completion of long-pending major and medium irrigation projects
  • (b)Micro-irrigation and other water-saving technologies
  • (c)Repair and restoration of traditional water bodies
  • (d)Soil and moisture conservation in rainfed areas

  Answer(b) Micro-irrigation and other water-saving technologies

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The slogan 'Har Khet Ko Pani' is associated with which one of the following schemes ?

  • (a)Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana
  • (b)Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana
  • (c)Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana
  • (d)Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana

  Answer(a) Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana