Krushi Mahotsav (Agriculture Festival), Gujarat

What is Krushi Mahotsav?

Krushi Mahotsav is the Government of Gujarat's annual agriculture outreach campaign, run by the Directorate of Agriculture under the Department of Agriculture, Farmers Welfare and Co-operation. According to the Directorate of Agriculture, the campaign began in 2005-06 and was built around a single idea captured in its slogan: agricultural scientists at the doorstep of the farmer. Instead of asking farmers to travel to a research station or a district office, Krushi Mahotsav sends scientists, extension officers and departmental staff into villages and talukas for a concentrated few days.

Krushi Mahotsav is not a benefit scheme with a form and a sanction order. It is a delivery mechanism. The Directorate describes it as bringing modern implements, agricultural methods, water harvesting and electricity harvesting programmes to farmers at village level, together with seminars, exhibitions, distribution of assistance kits and recognition of progressive farmers. Readers searching for it as Krishi Mahotsav Yojana will find the same campaign.

What the campaign covers

• Soil Health Cards, so farmers can see the nutrient status of their own fields and correct fertiliser use instead of guessing.
• Guidance on scientific farming, organic farming, farm mechanisation, micro-irrigation and crop value addition from agricultural scientists and officers.
• Information on government schemes, which subsidies and insurance products a particular farmer qualifies for, and how to apply on the ikhedut portal.
• Free input kits distributed to small farmers during the Mahotsav.
• Exhibitions of progressive farmers' produce, drone technology, soil testing, new-age fertilisers and research relevant to farmers.

What happens during a Krushi Mahotsav?

Krushi Mahotsav is organised at village, taluka, district and state level. Teams of agricultural scientists together with officers from the Agriculture and Rural Development departments visit villages, hold meetings, take questions and work through farmers' problems on the spot.

The Rabi Krushi Mahotsav 2025 gives a sense of the scale. It was organised on 14 and 15 October 2025 at 261 district- and taluka-level locations across Gujarat, with roughly 3 lakh farmers expected to participate and about 2,800 exhibition stalls put up. During that Mahotsav, assistance sanction letters and orders worth approximately Rs 500 crore were handed to over 5 lakh farmer beneficiaries under schemes of the Agriculture, Horticulture and Animal Husbandry departments.

That last point explains how the campaign really works. Krushi Mahotsav does not create a new entitlement; it is the occasion on which sanction letters for existing schemes are physically handed over, which is why farmers often associate the festival with receiving benefits.

Who can take part in Krushi Mahotsav?

You can attend if:

• You are a farmer in Gujarat, of any age, caste, religion or gender.
• You are a woman farmer, women farmers are specifically named as a target group.
• You want to learn about new practices, get your soil tested, or find out which departmental schemes you qualify for.

There is no minimum landholding, no income ceiling and no registration to attend a Krushi Mahotsav seminar or exhibition.

Where people are not eligible is on the benefit side rather than the attendance side:

• People or entities not involved in farming or agriculture are outside the scope of the campaign's assistance.
• People or entities that hold no agricultural land cannot be registered for the land-linked departmental schemes distributed at the camps.
• Farmers without a valid Aadhaar card, or with an Aadhaar not linked to a bank account, cannot receive DBT-based scheme benefits routed through the Mahotsav, because the payment cannot reach them.
• Farmers who have defaulted on loans from banks or co-operative societies may be barred from specific credit-linked benefits distributed at the camp.

Attendance itself remains open. A landless agricultural labourer can walk into a Krushi Mahotsav seminar and learn from it, but cannot be sanctioned a land-linked subsidy there.

How to apply for Krushi Mahotsav and take part in a camp

1. Watch for the announcement. Krushi Mahotsav dates are announced by the Directorate of Agriculture and publicised through the village panchayat, the Village Level Worker, the Gram Sevak and local media. Rabi Krushi Mahotsav dates in recent years have fallen around mid-October.
2. Find your camp. Locations are fixed at taluka and district headquarters and, for the village-level phase, at the village itself. Ask your Gram Sevak or the taluka agriculture office which location covers your village.
3. Attend on the day with your land records if you have them. No form, no fee and no prior registration are needed to enter.
4. Use the stalls. Submit a soil sample for testing, collect or update your Soil Health Card, and see the demonstrations on micro-irrigation, farm mechanisation and drone spraying.
5. Ask the scheme desk which subsidies you qualify for. Officers at the camp will tell you what to file on the ikhedut portal and what documents to collect.
6. Collect any kit or sanction letter in your name, and keep the acknowledgement.

How does Krushi Mahotsav connect to actual subsidies?

Krushi Mahotsav is the front door, not the counter. The cash and subsidy schemes that farmers hear about at the camps; farm machinery assistance, drip and sprinkler irrigation subsidy, horticulture assistance, animal husbandry unit subsidies — are all applied for separately on the ikhedut portal (ikhedut.gujarat.gov.in), which is the Gujarat government's single window for agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry and fisheries scheme applications.

The practical sequence for a farmer is:

1. Attend the Krushi Mahotsav camp and identify the scheme that fits your holding and crop.
2. Note the document list for that scheme from the officers at the camp.
3. Apply on ikhedut.gujarat.gov.in during that scheme's open window, take a printout of the confirmed application, sign it, and submit it with documents to the office named on the form.
4. Track the application through the ikhedut portal's application status option.

Krushi Mahotsav also serves as the occasion for the state to release sanction orders in bulk, which is why a farmer who applied months earlier on ikhedut may be called to a Mahotsav venue to collect the letter.

What does Krushi Mahotsav cost a farmer?

Nothing. There is no participation fee, no registration fee and no application fee for Krushi Mahotsav. Soil testing at the camp, the seminar, the exhibition and the input kits distributed to small farmers are all free. Any person demanding money to "enrol" a farmer for Krushi Mahotsav is not acting on behalf of the Agriculture Department, and should be reported to the taluka agriculture officer.

Where can a farmer get help or complain?

• Kisan Call Centre: 1800-180-1551, the national toll-free farm advisory line, answers crop, input and scheme questions in Gujarati.
• Directorate of Agriculture, Gujarat: dag.gujarat.gov.in carries the official Krushi Mahotsav page and the Directorate's contact list.
• Taluka Agriculture Officer or Village Level Worker, for questions about camp dates, venue and kit distribution in your village.
• ikhedut portal, ikhedut.gujarat.gov.in, for anything to do with a scheme application filed after the camp.

If a kit or sanction letter announced in your name at a Mahotsav is not handed over, raise it in writing with the District Agriculture Officer, quoting the camp date and venue. The distribution lists are prepared in advance at district level, so the record of your entitlement exists there.

Is Krushi Mahotsav still running?

Yes. Krushi Mahotsav has run since 2005-06 and the Rabi edition in October 2025 was held across 261 locations, so the campaign is active rather than discontinued. The format has changed over the years, the early editions were built around the Krushi Rath moving village to village over a month, while recent editions concentrate large district- and taluka-level events into a shorter window with more exhibition content and bulk sanction distribution. Farmers should therefore not assume the campaign will reach their village in the same form every year, and should confirm the venue for their taluka with the local agriculture office each season.

How to check your application status

Krushi Mahotsav itself has no application to track: a farmer who simply attends a camp has nothing to check. What can and should be tracked is the underlying scheme application or sanction that the camp connects a farmer to.

If you applied for a scheme on ikhedut around or after a Mahotsav:

1. Go to ikhedut.gujarat.gov.in and open the "Application Status" or "Check Status" option on the scheme's page.
2. Enter the application number printed on the confirmation you took after submitting the form online, along with your mobile number or Aadhaar as the portal asks.
3. The portal shows whether the application is pending at taluka level, sent for verification, approved, or sanctioned. It does not show live tracking for every scheme; some entries only update once a decision is recorded.
4. If the online status has not changed for several weeks, follow up in person at the taluka agriculture office that the application was routed to, quoting the application number.

If you are waiting on a sanction letter or kit announced at a Mahotsav:

1. Note the camp date, venue, and the name of the scheme or kit you were told about, since Mahotsav distribution lists are prepared district-wise in advance and are matched against this information rather than an application number.
2. Contact the District Agriculture Officer or the taluka agriculture office and ask whether your name is on the sanction or kit list for that Mahotsav cycle.
3. If you were verbally told you qualify but were not called to collect anything, ask specifically whether your case moved to the next Mahotsav cycle or a separate disbursal round, since bulk handovers at the camp do not cover every sanctioned case on the same day.
4. For a general update on any scheme discussed at the camp, call the Kisan Call Centre at 1800-180-1551, which can look up scheme-level status information and redirect you to the right district office.

There is no SMS-based or portal-based status check for the Mahotsav campaign itself, only for the individual schemes it connects farmers to.

Common reasons for rejection

Rejection at Krushi Mahotsav does not apply to attendance, since no one is turned away from a camp. It applies to the scheme benefits and kits discussed and sanctioned there. The recurring reasons an underlying application or sanction fails are:

• No agricultural land in the applicant's name. Several of the schemes promoted at the camp, such as farm mechanisation or irrigation subsidy, are tied to land records. An applicant whose land is still in a deceased parent's name, or who farms land they do not own or lease formally, gets rejected at verification. The fix is to update the land record (7/12 or equivalent revenue record) before applying, not after.
• Aadhaar not linked to the bank account used for DBT. Since benefits handed out through Mahotsav-linked schemes are paid by direct benefit transfer, a mismatch between the Aadhaar number and the bank account, or an account that is not Aadhaar-seeded, causes the payment to fail even after sanction. Farmers should confirm Aadhaar-bank seeding at their bank branch before the application stage, not after a sanction letter is issued.
• Applying for a scheme the farmer's holding does not qualify for. Camp officers explain eligibility verbally, but the ikhedut portal enforces it strictly, for instance size-of-holding caps on certain machinery subsidies or crop-specific conditions on horticulture assistance. An application filed without checking these limits against the officer's guidance is rejected on a technical mismatch, not a discretionary call.
• Missing or mismatched supporting documents. Land records, caste or category certificates for reserved-category benefit slabs, and bank passbook copies that do not match the name or spelling on the Aadhaar card are a common cause of the taluka office returning an application for correction. Carrying the exact documents the camp desk lists, in the same name spelling as Aadhaar, avoids this round trip.
• Loan default with a bank or co-operative society. Credit-linked assistance distributed through Mahotsav-connected schemes can be denied to farmers with an existing default, since the disbursing bank or society checks repayment history before releasing its share. Clearing or restructuring the existing loan first is the only fix; the Mahotsav camp desk cannot waive this check.
• Applying after the scheme's window has closed. Individual schemes promoted at a Krushi Mahotsav, unlike the campaign itself, run on the ikhedut portal's own open and close dates. An application filed after a scheme's window shuts is rejected regardless of how recently it was discussed at a camp; the safe approach is to apply on ikhedut the same week as the Mahotsav, while the window a camp officer pointed to is still open.