Dairy farmers told to link Aadhaar to bank account for incentives

 The state government has issued a circular recently making it mandatory for dairy farmers to link their Aadhaar number to bank accounts so as to avail of incentives doled out by them.

The state government has been disbursing an incentive of Rs 4 per litre to milk producers but has now sent a circular stating that the incentives will not be released if Aadhaar number is not linked to their accounts.

According to the circular dispatched to all district milk unions in the state, it has warned that the incentives from the month of July will not be released if Aadhaar is not seeded to the bank accounts.

It may be mentioned that seeding of Aadhaar number to ration cards was earlier made mandatory and now has been made compulsory to get incentives for the milk supplied. More than 35 lakh dairy farmers supply milk to the Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF) and there are 1.5 lakh milk producers in Mandya district alone, stated an official who added that so far, the incentive was being remitted to their bank accounts but henceforth, they would have to link Aadhaar numbers to get the benefit.

The official opined that there had been confusion prevailing over the linking process as although all the dairy farmers supplying milk to the Mandya District Cooperative Milk Union (MANMUL) had bank accounts, a majority of them had not linked their Aadhaar numbers to the bank account more so because most of them had not received their Aadhaar cards.

Speaking to DH, T Gurulingaiah, Managing Director, Manmul, confirmed that the government has made it mandatory to link Aadhaar numbers to get the incentives.

Rs 36 cr to be released

The outstanding incentive grant from the government would be released to the beneficiaries after Deepavali, stated an official who added that since the amount of Rs 36 crore was pending from March 2016 to June, it would be soon remitted to the accounts of the farmers.The official added that the remaining amount for the next three months would be released after Aadhaar numbers are linked.