“The demonstration of seed minikits programme lacks seriousness both in distribution and demonstration and the mechanism of performance evaluation,” says the report. The team came across a list of minikit beneficiary in Ujjain which was prepared without actually delivering the goods to the farmers.

Infrastructure:

The Centre gives money for providing sprinkler sets, pipes and setting up infrastructure for threshing, drying, seed-processing and grading. Apart from Chhattisgarh and Tamil Nadu, most states have not even used 30% of the total funds provided under this head. States like Gujarat, Haryana and Karnataka have used nothing at all. Rajasthan does not even bother to report progress on this despite several reminders from the Directorate.

No states were able to provide figures on how much additional area had increased as a result of use of sprinklers.

Integrated Pest Management:

Biopesticides in several states have been found to be spurious. Rhizobium, a micronutrient that can increase the

yield by 20-30 per cent, is not even available in most places. In the absence of a technological breakthrough that can make pulse crop resistant to insects, these steps are the best bet to increase the yield.

Manpower:

The programme has created and placed several officers to monitor developmental progress. For example, Rajasthan had 55 posts and Madhya Pradesh had 67. However, nobody at the Centre is monitoring their work as they get shunted to routine agricultural jobs over time.

To make matters worse, the state extension service has effectively collapsed with one third posts lying vacant. On an average, each state has one extension officer for every 100 square km. They are the ones who are supposed to appraise farmers of new sowing practices or new seeds that come out from the Indian Institute of Pulses Research. Visits to the field to talk to farmers are few and far between. Says Swaminathan: “The links in the chain are missing. It is not really a mission as it was meant to be.”