The Agriculture Department of Maharashtra is planning to install CCTV cameras in approximately 2,092 Automatic Weather Stations (AWSs) concerning their safeguard and in prevention from tampering.

A major information campaign is also underway to educate the farmers about schemes related to crop insurance, as stated by Dheeraj Kumar, the Commissioner for Agriculture. He also added that the concern for installing CCTV cameras has not been raised in the past. He also added that measures have to be taken to safeguard the AWSs.

In many of the cases, the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) is thought of as a scheme which would give assured payment, which goes against the very principle of insurance. This statement was given by an official from the agriculture department in response to the educational program for farmers.

An Artificial-Intelligence (AI) based platform has also been proposed to protect the AWSs as per the information given by officials.

The proposal of camera installation for the protection of AWSs has been introduced following incidents of tampering with the devices. The agriculture department has lodged a police complaint against unknown people, of trifling with the rainfall measuring units of the devices. These incidents took place in Ahmednagar district, in the Deodaithan revenue circle of Shrigonda taluka.

The rainfall measuring unit in the AWSs showed medium to heavy rainfall in the period from August 28th to September 2nd. Many other parameters did not agree to this rainfall measurement, suggesting that the devices had been tampered.

The officials believe that this was done to strike the ‘triggers’ required for excess rainfall that would provide payment of compensation under the Weather Based Crop Insurance Scheme (WBCIS) for the horticulture crops. Similar incidents were reported last year in the Jalgaon region. Three such events took place where ice blocks had been placed on radiation measuring devices on several devices of AWSs.

According to the officials, such incidents are not uncommon in regions of Jalgaon, Ahmednagar, and Nanded. Either the radiation meters or the rain gauges are tampered with as the other instruments like those for measuring wind speed or directions are not easy to manipulate as stated by the officials.

The AWS network was set up in Maharashtra in every revenue circle under the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) scheme. Skymet- which is a private forecaster is in partnership with the government to set up the AWSs network. It will collect and maintain the necessary data. This data will be purchased by various insurance companies which shall then substantiate the claims to avail compensations for the crops that are destroyed, under the PMFBY.