Question : Relief for Natural Calamities

(a) whether the Government provides Central Assistance as relief for losses due to natural calamities;

(b) if so, the criterion fixed for providing Central assistance to the States for natural calamities and the details of the Central assistance provided to the affected States during the last three years and the current year, State-wise;

(c) whether some States have registered their protest for not getting assistance in time in this regard and if so, the details thereof;

(d) whether some States are not satisfied with the amount of Central assistance provided to them and if so, details of the action taken by the Government in this regard, State-wise; and

(e) whether the Government proposes to help the affected farmers, if so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor?

MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF HOME AFFAIRS
(SHRI KIREN RIJIJU)

(a) to (e): As per the National Disaster Management Policy, the primary responsibility for disaster management rests with the States. The concerned State Governments undertake relief activities according to the magnitude of the ground situation, in the wake of natural calamities from the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) already placed at their disposal in
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accordance with Government of India approved items and norms without any discrimination. For calamity of a severe nature, additional assistance is supplemented by Government of India from the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF) by following the laid down procedure.

The corpus of SDRF is contributed by the Government of India and the State Government in the ratio 75:25 for General Category States and 90:10 for Special Category States. NDRF is fully funded by the Government of India. Under the prevailing guidelines, the first charge of relief expenditure is on the SDRF. Allocation of SDRF for the each State Government is done by the Finance Commission (set-up under the Article 280 of constitution from time-to-time), for the Award period. The Central share of SDRF is to be released in two equal instalments, first in June and the second in December subject to fulfillment of conditions of the guidelines. Financial assistance under SDRF/ NDRF in the wake of natural calamities is by way of relief and not for compensation of loss as suffered/ claimed. Additional expenditure, if any, incurred over and above or on other than approved items/ norms, is required to be met by the States from their own resources.

State-wise details of allocation and releases from SDRF and NDRF during the last three year and the current year are given in Annexure.
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With regard to help to the affected farmers, it is informed that assistance is provided to the affected farmers from SDRF/ NDRF as per the norms applicable in the wake of other notified natural calamities. The extant norms inter-alia provide for assistance to the farmers in the form of Agriculture input subsidy (where crop loss is 33% and above) for damage caused to all types agriculture/ horticulture crop areas due to the notified natural disasters. These are Rs. 6,800/- per ha. for rainfed crops areas, Rs. 13,500/- per ha. for assured irrigated areas, subject to minimum assistance of not less than Rs.1000 and restricted to sown areas, and Rs. 18,000/- per ha. for all type of perennial crops areas, subject to minimum assistance not less than Rs. 2000/- and restricted to sown areas., where crop loss is more than 33% and above.

In addition to regular schemes the farmers are entitled for compensation under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) of the Ministry of Agriculture, which is being implemented by the concerned State Governments.





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