Around 70 lakh farmers in Maharashtra facing technical glitches with the Centre’s Digital Crop Survey mobile app can now register their crops offline via the e-ferfar system, an official said.
An official on Saturday, November 7 said that following directions from Revenue Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule, the state revenue department on Friday issued a Government Resolution (GR) permitting talathi-level crop inspections in places where online registration is pending for the ongoing Kharif season, as per PTI.
According to the GR issued by the Maharashtra Government, the state introduced the e-crop inspection system on August 15, 2021, enabling farmers to register crop details through their mobile phones. The process aims to make crop registration accessible and transparent.
Later on December 1, 2024, the state government introduced technical changes in the application, to facilitate crop registration through the AgriStack platform.
Technical errors reported in Digital Crop Survey
However, the Digital Crop Survey application has faced problems during the ongoing Kharif season, making online registration difficult in some areas.
The GR listed four issues affecting the process, including instances wherein the mobile application shows a distance of more than 20 metres between the actual field and the field boundary displayed on the application, despite the farmer being physically present.
It also cited instances of interchanged maps in the application, the absence of maps for entire villages and the unavailability of names and land account numbers of farmers in the application.
The government further said that in cases where online registration remains impossible despite attempts to resolve these technical issues, crop registration through the e-ferfar system would be permitted as an alternative for the ongoing Kharif season.
Maharashtra disburses Rs 4,372 crore to 87.45 lakh drought-hit farmers
Earlier on Friday, more than 87.45 lakh farmers across Maharashtra’s 304 drought-affected talukas have received a total of Rs 4,372.83 crore in Diwali advance assistance as of Thursday, state Relief and Rehabilitation Minister Makarand Jadhav Patil said.
The assistance was announced by Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who had assured eligible farmers of Rs 5,000 each ahead of Diwali to provide financial relief amid the drought situation.
The government is continuing the process of transferring assistance to the remaining eligible farmers. Payments that have been held up due to technical issues will be released once the problems are resolved, Jadhav Patil said.
The Revenue, Relief and Rehabilitation, and Agriculture departments worked on a war footing to ensure that the assistance was transferred directly into farmers’ bank accounts, the minister said.
(With inputs from PTI)
