KANPUR: Police have booked nine bank managers, three crop insurance employees, and 32 farmers—14 of them landless—for their alleged involvement in a Rs 68 lakh crop insurance fraud in Uttar Pradesh’s Farrukhabad district, in violation of the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) rules.
The case relates to the 2024 rabi season, when HDFC Ergo insured crops belonging to 8,849 farmers in the district. Following crop damage, the insurer disbursed Rs 2.28 crore in compensation to 232 farmers. Investigators later found that Rs 68 lakh of this amount had been fraudulently transferred to 35 landless farmers.
Two FIRs were lodged by the deputy director of agriculture. The irregularities came to light after district magistrate Ashutosh Kumar Dwivedi ordered a verification of landholdings of farmers who had received insurance payouts exceeding Rs 1 lakh.
A probe conducted by the naib tehsildar, kanungo, and assistant development officer (agriculture) revealed that the 35 beneficiaries did not own any land at the locations mentioned in the insurance claim records. In Balipatti Rani gram panchayat of Amritpur tehsil, 14 of the 15 farmers who received crop insurance compensation were found to be landless, collectively receiving Rs 24.89 lakh.
In another instance, a farmer owning just 0.026 hectare of land was paid Rs 2.57 lakh as compensation, far exceeding the eligible amount of Rs 2,228.
