Water resources ministry becomes nodal agency to implement PMKSY

The Union water resources ministry will once again become the nodal ministry for implementing Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ambitious Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY).

It was initially the nodal department for implementing the programme, but the responsibility was later shifted to agriculture department.

However, as most big projects and dams are executed under the ministry of water resources, PMKSY has once again gone back to the ministry. "Yes, water resources ministry will now be the nodal department for executing the programme, while other things like preparation of district irrigation plans etc will continue as they are now," said a senior government official.

Under PMKSY, the government plans to spend Rs 50,000 crore over five years. It seeks to amalgamate three major ongoing irrigation programmes of the Centre - the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme of Ministry of Water Resources, Integrated Watershed management programme of Ministry of Rural Development and Land Resources, and the farm water management component of National Mission on Sustainable Agriculture of the Department of Agriculture.

The scheme would be implemented in 'mission mode', which means the district administration draws up their own irrigation plan with the help of district forest officers, lead bank officer and other departments. The state irrigation plan will be an amalgamation of all the district plans.

In the 2015-16 Budget, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley allocated Rs 5,300 crore for the same. According to official data, till 2011-12, as much as 46 per cent of India's net sown area of 141 million hectares was under irrigation.

Meanwhile, in a related development, a joint team of senior officials from the ministry of agriculture, rural development, land resources and Indian Agriculture Research Institute have been sent to western Uttar Pradesh districts Meerut and Muzaffarnagar to study the status of irrigation development and also PMKSY.

The team will visit some villages in both the districts and submit a report.

It will also assess the existing water bodies, farm ponds and other sources of irrigation in the districts and assess the irrigation requirement in sugarcane areas.

Western Uttar Pradesh is one of major sugarcane growing belts of India.