Farmer ID Scheme
By Shivaji Sarkar
In a landmark move echoing the ambition of Todarmal’s legendary land reforms under Emperor Akbar, the Indian government has launched a transformative Farmer Identity Scheme. This reform marks a significant stride in the modernisation of Indian agriculture. By assigning a robust digital identity to farmers, the initiative aims to tackle long-standing challenges around accessibility, transparency, and financial inclusion—ushering in a tech-driven agricultural revolution.
With its wide range of benefits and user-friendly implementation, the Farmer ID has the potential to become a cornerstone of rural empowerment and sustainable agricultural growth in India. Already, under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) Yojana, eligible landholding farmer families receive a direct financial benefit of ¹ 6,000 per year. The Kisan ID is used to identify these farmers and ensures that payments are made directly into their Aadhaar-linked bank accounts. The move is expected to cut drastically administrative expenses.
Todarmal’s land reforms are known as among the most expansive for measuring land, identifying locations, sizes, and other basic data. The first written patta to individual landowners was issued with precision in the subas of Avadh and Agra—present-day Uttar Pradesh. Though envisioned as a universal system, it faltered in Bihar and other regions distant from the Mughal capital. In Bihar, entire villages were issued a collective patta, which has led to ongoing disputes. Even today, Bihar records the highest number of land-related disputes—an issue that must be examined as part of the new digital system.
So far, the scheme has provided digital identities to about 7 crore landholding farmers—out of an estimated 26.3 crore total farmers. Only those who own land are being enrolled. However, agriculture is far more complex, and identifying all those involved—tenants, sharecroppers, agricultural labourers—remains a challenge.
Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan has emphasised that the scheme ensures timely financial support, with payments made regularly. The Aadhaar-linked bank account system ensures that the benefits are transferred directly, making the process simple and secure. Each registered farmer receives a digital Farmer ID, with their personal and agricultural data securely stored in a centralized database.
The Farmer ID serves as unique identification number for each farmer, the government says, enabling them to receive targeted support and opening up a host of opportunities previously out of reach. More than just a number, the Farmer ID is set to become a gateway to financial aid, technological assistance, and efficient government service delivery in rural India. The government says that this ID ensures that farmers could directly access agricultural loans, crop insurance, input subsidies, and other government schemes — reducing the need for intermediaries and minimising delays. It does not need the farmers to move to the patwaris and other land or district officers for documentation or authentication of documents as their land records are being digitally uploaded with other financial details and are accessible through Aadhaar.
That is how the PM-KISAN pension scheme facilitates the ¹ 6,000 annual payout. Yet, some reservations remain. Linking Aadhaar, PAN, and now land records raises concerns about data security and privacy. The government assures that access is permission-based and that data is protected—but apprehensions persist, especially given instances of financial fraud.
Land ownership further complicates matters. Many plots are jointly owned, sometimes by several people with fractional shares. It’s unclear how these will be handled—whether there will be joint IDs or other mechanisms. Clarification is needed on how pattas will be digitised for such cases.
Even the exact number of farmers remains uncertain. According to the 2011 Census, India had 26.3 crore farmers—11.8 crore cultivators and 14.4 crore agricultural labourers. But definitions vary across government surveys, including the Agricultural Census, NSSO, and Periodic Labour Force Survey. Moreover, the data is outdated. A key observation from 2011 was the decline in the percentage of the workforce engaged in agriculture—from 58.2 per cent in 2001 to 54.6 per cent in 2011. A more recent NABARD survey noted that average landholding sizes fell by 31 per cent between 2016-17 and 2021-22.
There are e-NAM registrations as well. The number of farmers registered on the e-National Agriculture Market (e-NAM) platform is on the rise, indicating an increasing number of farmers participating in modern market practices. As of March 2025, nearly 17 million farmers were registered on e-NAM, with Uttar Pradesh leading in registration numbers.
The agricultural workforce was shifting from cultivators to labourers. An important change, according to National Highway Authority of India (NHAI), is shifting of 50 lakh hectares of land from farms to roads. Its social and economic impact has yet to be studied since 2019.
The land ownership is also not simple. The Agriculture Census considers any land used for agriculture, even if it’s not owned by the person using it. A large percentage of farmers in India are small and marginal, typically owning less than two hectares of land.
In 2020-21, agriculture employed more than half of India’s workforce and contributed 20.2% to the country’s GDP. India is the world’s second largest producer of food grains, fruits, and vegetables, tea, farmed fish, cotton, sugarcane, wheat, and rice. Many of these have differing farm pattern. A critical area is the sharecropping or leasehold farming. The Farmer ID is not supposed to include these. This could be a lacuna.
The agriculture sector in India has the second largest land in the world. It includes land-based farmers. Variation is too wide. It includes crop; Livestock; Dairy and Poultry farmers. There are also Truck farmers, who grow a variety of vegetables for sale in local markets.
This apart there are Fishermen engaging in fishing for commercial purposes Aquaculture or fish farmers and Recreational/Sport fishers. Though activities differ, there are overlaps as well. How these categories be listed, if some or many of them, want to be registered as farmer is not clear. The move may be good but there are various dimensions that need to be sorted out for having the ID as an effective tool. — INFA