Just days before Diwali 2026, over 9.34 crore farmers across India woke up to a direct deposit in their bank accounts — no middleman, no delay. Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the 24th instalment of the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme from Banaskantha, Gujarat on 30 October 2026, transferring more than ₹18,690 crore in a single sweep. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath took to X to acknowledge the transfer, expressing gratitude on behalf of the state's farming community.

UP's 2.24 Crore Farmers Among the Beneficiaries

In his post, CM Yogi noted that more than 2.24 crore farmers from Uttar Pradesh have benefited from this instalment — making the state one of the largest beneficiary pools in the country. He framed the transfer as a 'Diwali se poorv prapt uphar' (a gift received before Diwali), a pointed piece of political timing that the BJP has deployed with precision in previous tranches as well.

CM Yogi's post quoted the governing philosophy driving the programme: 'Kisanon ki khushhaali mein gaanvon ki samriddhi aur gaanvon ki samriddhi mein rashtra ki pragati nihit hai' — 'In the prosperity of farmers lies the wealth of villages, and in the wealth of villages lies the progress of the nation.' That framing is not incidental; it directly positions agricultural welfare as the spine of national development.

PM-KISAN at a Glance: Eight Years of Direct Transfers

Launched in December 2018, PM-KISAN provides landholding farmers ₹6,000 per year in three equal instalments of ₹2,000, credited directly to bank accounts under the government's Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) architecture. The first instalment went out in February 2019; the 24th marks roughly eight years of the scheme in operation — a cadence of one release roughly every four months.

The scheme's design was built to eliminate leakages that plagued earlier agricultural subsidy pipelines. By routing funds through the Aadhaar-linked banking system, the Centre claims near-real-time delivery to millions of small and marginal farmers who previously depended on state intermediaries.

The 'Double Engine' Framing and What It Signals

CM Yogi's post explicitly invoked the BJP's signature 'double engine government' formulation — the argument that having the same party at the Centre and in state capitals accelerates welfare delivery and reduces political friction. For Uttar Pradesh, which carries one of the country's largest rural populations, that coordination claim has tangible stakes: any delay in beneficiary list updates or bank-seeding failures at the state level directly affects crore-scale numbers.

The CM also flagged three simultaneous goals: bringing positive change to farmers' lives, raising their income, and reducing the cost of cultivation — a nod to the wider agrarian stress that income-support schemes alone do not fully address. The next Union Budget and any revision to per-beneficiary amounts will test how far that commitment extends.