Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta on Thursday, June 11, 2026, credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government with transforming farmer welfare policy over the past 12 years, citing three flagship schemes as pillars of agricultural support. She framed the shift as a fundamental change in how the nation views its farming community.

Context

Posting under the hashtag #12YearsOfKisanSamriddhi (12 Years of Farmer Prosperity), CM Gupta wrote that under PM Modi's leadership, farmer welfare had been advanced 'with a spirit of service and compassion.' She specifically highlighted the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN), the Kisan Credit Card, and the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) as instruments that provided support, financial strength, and security respectively.

In her words, PM-KISAN 'provided support in difficult times,' the Kisan Credit Card 'gave the strength to move forward,' and crop insurance 'instilled confidence of protection in times of crisis.' The post was accompanied by a video.

Policy Backdrop

PM-KISAN, launched in February 2019, provides ₹6,000 per year in direct cash transfers to eligible landholding farmer families through the Direct Benefit Transfer mechanism. The scheme was designed as an unconditional income support measure to supplement farm household earnings.

The Kisan Credit Card scheme, a longstanding programme for short-term crop loans at concessional rates, received a renewed push from 2018–19 onwards with targets to expand coverage to all eligible farmers and link it with interest subvention benefits. PMFBY, introduced in 2016, replaced earlier crop insurance schemes with a yield-based compensation model to protect farmers against losses from natural calamities.

Together, these three instruments represent the central government's three-pronged approach: income support, credit access, and risk mitigation — addressing the structural vulnerabilities that have historically driven farmer distress in India.

Stakeholders and Impact

The primary beneficiaries of these schemes are India's farming households, particularly smallholder and marginal farmers who are most exposed to income volatility, monsoon dependence, and limited access to formal credit. Rural households across states have been the target demographic for all three programmes.

CM Gupta argued that the cumulative effect has been a shift in national perspective: farmers are no longer viewed 'merely as recipients of assistance' but as 'the foundation of India's self-reliance, food security, and prosperity.' This framing aligns with the broader Viksit Bharat (Developed India) narrative that the ruling BJP has built its agricultural communications around.

She added that growing farmer confidence, new possibilities in agriculture, and rising hope in rural India are together 'providing new strength to the resolve of a Developed India.'

What's Next

The #12YearsOfKisanSamriddhi campaign signals a coordinated political messaging effort across BJP leaders to mark a decade-plus of the Modi government's agricultural policy record. Observers will watch whether scheme modifications or new announcements follow in the next Union Budget cycle or in upcoming agricultural ministry reviews.

With the next agricultural season approaching, the government's ability to demonstrate tangible outcomes — particularly on credit coverage under the Kisan Credit Card and claim settlement rates under PMFBY — will determine whether the narrative of farmer prosperity translates into measurable rural confidence ahead of future electoral cycles.