Assistance for Damage to Agricultural Land and Other Losses, Uttarakhand

What is the assistance for damage to agricultural land in Uttarakhand?

Assistance for Damage to Agricultural Land and Other Losses is a relief measure paid from the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) by the Department of Disaster Management and Rehabilitation, Government of Uttarakhand, through the Uttarakhand State Disaster Management Authority (USDMA) and the district administration, with the agriculture and revenue departments carrying out the field assessment. It compensates farmers whose fields are buried under silt and debris, whose land is carried away entirely, or whose standing crops are destroyed in a notified natural disaster.

Uttarakhand's farming is unusually exposed to this kind of loss. Terraced hill fields sit directly below unstable slopes, and a single cloudburst can bury a season's cultivation under boulders and silt or take away the terrace itself. Along the Ganga, Yamuna, Alaknanda, Ramganga and Sharda, a shift in the river course during the monsoon can permanently remove land from the revenue record's cultivable area. The SDRF, constituted under the Disaster Management Act, 2005, is the standing fund that answers these losses, and its agriculture items are rule-based rather than announced afresh after each event.

How much assistance is paid?

The SDRF norms that Uttarakhand follows separate land damage from crop damage.

Restoration of damaged land; where the field is buried and can be brought back into cultivation:

• Rs 18,000 per hectare for each of de-silting, removal of debris and restoration, where the deposit is more than three inches and this is certified by the competent authority.
• Subject to a minimum of Rs 2,200 per farmer, so a very small holding still receives a usable amount.
• Payable only where no other assistance or subsidy has been availed of, or is available, under any other government scheme.

Loss of land, where the land itself is gone:

• Rs 47,000 per hectare where land is lost to landslide, avalanche or a change in the course of a river.
• Restricted to small and marginal farmers whose ownership of the land is legitimate as per the revenue records.
• Subject to a minimum of Rs 5,000 per farmer.

Input subsidy for crop loss; where the crop, not the land, is destroyed and the loss is 33 per cent or more:

• Rs 8,500 per hectare in rainfed areas, subject to a minimum of Rs 1,000 per farmer and restricted to the sown area.
• Rs 17,000 per hectare in assured irrigated areas, subject to a minimum of Rs 2,000 per farmer and restricted to the sown area.
• Rs 22,500 per hectare for perennial crops and agro-forestry planted on the farmer's own land, subject to a minimum of Rs 2,500 per farmer.
• Assistance is subject to a ceiling of 2 hectares per farmer, and the same per-hectare rates apply to farmers holding more than 2 hectares within that ceiling.

Who is eligible for this assistance?

You can claim if:

• You are a farmer in Uttarakhand whose agricultural land or standing crop was damaged in a notified natural disaster; flood, cloudburst, landslide, avalanche, earthquake, hailstorm, cyclone, frost or cold wave.
• Your ownership of the land is recorded in the revenue records. For the Rs 47,000 per hectare land-loss head this is a hard condition, and it is limited to small and marginal farmers.
• The damage is certified by the joint damage-assessment survey, including the affected area and, for restoration claims, that the silt or debris deposit exceeds three inches.
• For crop loss, the damage is assessed at 33 per cent or more.

You are not eligible and cannot claim if:

• You have already availed of, or are eligible for, another government subsidy or assistance for the same loss. The SDRF norms explicitly bar double compensation, and this includes crop insurance settlements for the same event.
• The land is not recorded in your name in the revenue records. Tenants and sharecroppers without a recorded interest cannot claim the land-loss head.
• The crop loss is below 33 per cent, which is the threshold for the input subsidy.
• The silt or debris deposit is three inches or less, which is below the threshold for the restoration head.
• The damage was not caused by a notified disaster, a poor harvest, pest attack or ordinary erosion outside a declared calamity is not covered.
• No damage-assessment survey exists for your plot, so the area and extent of loss cannot be fixed.

The claim is driven by the survey, not by the application. A farmer whose fields were affected but who was not recorded during the field visit will usually need a re-survey before anything else can move.

What documents are required?

How to apply for the assistance

1. Report the damage immediately to your patwari, Tehsil office or the District Disaster Management Authority (DDMA). In many districts the agriculture department's block-level staff also record crop-loss reports after a calamity.
2. Be present for the damage survey. A joint team from revenue, disaster management and agriculture visits the affected fields and records the plot number, the area affected, the depth of silt or debris, and the percentage of crop loss.
3. Submit your claim at the Tehsil office with your khatauni or khasra, Aadhaar, bank passbook and the declaration that you have not received any other subsidy or insurance for the same loss.
4. Collect the acknowledgement and note the survey reference number.
5. Wait for sanction and credit. Once the district administration approves the assessment, the sanctioned amount is released from the State Disaster Response Fund and credited to your bank account.

There is no online application form for this SDRF head and no fee at any stage.

How to check the status of your claim

Follow-up is local, because the claim is sanctioned and paid by the district administration rather than through a state portal. Keep your acknowledgement and check with the Tehsil office where the claim was filed. If the survey is still pending, the patwari or revenue inspector for your area is the right first contact. If the survey is done but no sanction has issued, the District Disaster Management Authority under the District Magistrate is the office that holds the file.

Payment is by direct bank transfer, so verify at the time of filing that the account number and IFSC recorded against your name are correct, a failed transfer after sanction is one of the more frustrating delays to unpick.

Why claims get delayed or rejected

• No damage-assessment survey on record for the plot, so the area and extent cannot be certified.
• Land not recorded in the claimant's name, which blocks the land-loss head outright.
• Crop loss assessed below 33 per cent, below the input-subsidy threshold.
• Silt or debris deposit measured at three inches or less, below the restoration threshold.
• Another subsidy or insurance claim already received for the same loss.
• Bank or Aadhaar mismatch, causing the transfer to fail after sanction.

Where the assessment itself is disputed, the practical remedy is to ask the Tehsildar in writing for a re-survey, naming the khasra numbers concerned, before the district closes the relief file for that event.

What other SDRF help may go with this

Farm damage rarely arrives alone, and the same disaster often triggers several SDRF heads for one household. Under the same norms, an affected family in Uttarakhand may also receive:

• Housing assistance; Rs 1,30,000 per fully destroyed house in hilly areas and Rs 1,20,000 in the plains.
• Clothing and utensils: Rs 2,500 each, for families whose homes were washed away or fully damaged.
• Loss of milch or draught animals for small and marginal farmers and landless livestock owners — for example Rs 37,500 for a buffalo, cow, camel or yak, Rs 32,000 for a horse or bullock, Rs 20,000 for a calf, donkey, pony, mule or heifer and Rs 4,000 for a sheep, goat or pig, within the per-household ceilings. Poultry is compensated at Rs 100 per bird up to Rs 10,000 per household.
• Fodder in cattle camps; Rs 80 per day for a large animal and Rs 45 per day for a small animal.
• Ex-gratia for death in a notified disaster, Rs 4,00,000 to the next of kin.

The animal-loss head is conditional on the number and type of animals owned being registered with the local or designated authority, which is worth checking before a disaster rather than after one.

Help and where to raise a problem

• Uttarakhand State Disaster Management Authority (USDMA), usdma.uk.gov.in
• District Disaster Management Authority / District Magistrate office, runs the damage survey and sanctions the relief
• Tehsil / revenue office and the patwari. The first point to report farm damage
• District agriculture office, for crop-loss assessment questions

If a claim is wrongly rejected or the assessed area does not match your holding, the escalation runs to the District Magistrate as chair of the District Disaster Management Authority, and then to the state relief machinery under the Department of Disaster Management and Rehabilitation.

Key facts to remember

• Rs 18,000 per hectare for de-silting, debris removal and restoration (deposit over three inches), minimum Rs 2,200 per farmer.
• Rs 47,000 per hectare for land lost to landslide, avalanche or a change in river course, minimum Rs 5,000 per farmer, for small and marginal farmers with legitimate recorded ownership.
• Rs 8,500 / Rs 17,000 / Rs 22,500 per hectare input subsidy for rainfed, assured-irrigated and perennial crops where loss is 33 per cent or more, capped at 2 hectares per farmer.
• No double compensation: another subsidy or insurance for the same loss disqualifies the claim.
• Claims are offline, driven by the damage survey, and paid by direct bank transfer from the State Disaster Response Fund.

Note: these are the standing SDRF norm amounts Uttarakhand follows. For a specific disaster the district administration issues operative orders, so confirm the current process and any event-specific enhancement with your DDMA.