• Surath Choudhury

ABSTRACT: Agricultural Sector and Crop Insurance: The Ordeal of Minor and Small Farmers and the Need for Change: “There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery and the other that heat comes from the furnace” . Crop Insurance is one of the most important facets of the agricultural sector and it is the duty of the administration that the farmers are kept within the protective veil of insurance. The paper focuses on the plight of marginal farmers on their pursuit to secure insurances. The paper essentially compares the system that existed prior to 2014 and how the new government has brought about a change in ensuring efficiency in insuring marginal farmers. The paper starts off by analysing the current scenario of insurance in the agricultural sector of India and continues by laying focus on the difference between major farmers and marginal farmers and how marginal farmers are being discriminated upon the matter of securing insurance for their crops. The paper also lays emphasis upon the issue of securing crop insurance for natural disasters like floods, storms, drought among others. The main question that the paper shall look upon is whether the new scheme of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana is actually proving to be efficient or not in ensuring transparency and parity in catering insurance to the small and marginal farmers. The paper finally concludes by giving a roadmap as to how the plight of the small and marginal farmers can be relaxed and how transparency and parity can be ensured in insuring them.

KEYWORDS: Agricultural Sector, Crop Insurance, Marginal Farmers, Major Farmers, Natural Disasters, Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, Transparency, Small Farmers.

"Agricultural Sector and Crop Insurance: The Ordeal of Minor and Small Farmers and the Need for change", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.5, Issue 12, page no.774-780, December-2018, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR1812799.pdf

"Agricultural Sector and Crop Insurance: The Ordeal of Minor and Small Farmers and the Need for change", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.5, Issue 12, page no. pp774-780, December-2018, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR1812799.pdf