The ₹20 lakh figure is the old central one
Two mushroom cost norms are printed on Indian government pages right now. The lower one is not your state deciding to pay you less.
Open two state horticulture pages today and you can find two different cost norms for the same mushroom growing room. One says ₹30 lakh. The other says ₹20 lakh. It is tempting to read that as a policy difference, as though the second state decided to pay its growers less. That is not what it is, and the difference between the two is not small.
Both numbers are central numbers. One is current. The other is the one it replaced.
The number that is current
The central guideline in force prices a mushroom production unit at a ₹30 lakh cost norm, at 40% for a private applicant in a general area. The states in this atlas whose own implementation guidelines print that same figure are Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Karnataka and Telangana.
Production unit, general area, 40%
Worked out here from the rate below, not a total any single document prints on its own.
OPERATIONAL GUIDELINES MISSION FOR INTEGRATED DEVELOPMET OF HORTICULTURE (MIDH Operational Guidelines 2025)
Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Government of India (published on nhb.gov.in)
Printed 31 December 2024
“Annexure V, item III, Pattern of Assistance column, verbatim: "100% of the cost to public sector and 40% of cost for private sector, for meeting the expenditure on infrastructure, as credit linked back ended subsidy. In the case of NE & Himalayan States, Scheduled areas, vibrant…”Read the full clause
“Annexure V, item III, Pattern of Assistance column, verbatim: "100% of the cost to public sector and 40% of cost for private sector, for meeting the expenditure on infrastructure, as credit linked back ended subsidy. In the case of NE & Himalayan States, Scheduled areas, vibrant villages, Andaman & Nicobar and Lakshadweep Islands, assistance will be @ 50%." Rows (a) Production Unit, (b) Spawn making unit and (c) Compost making Unit each carry this same sentence, against their own printed cost norm.”
Annexure V, item III (a)/(b)/(c), PDF p.50
Read on 11 September 2026 by chirag.
The number that is not
₹20 lakh, at the same 40%, is the figure the current one replaced. It is printed in the Ministry of Agriculture’s own earlier MIDH Operational Guidelines, at the same annexure, under the same item heading, with the same sentence beside it.
The same unit, the same rate, the earlier norm
Worked out here from the rate below, not a total any single document prints on its own.
OPERATIONAL GUIDELINES MISSION FOR INTEGRATED DEVELOPMENT OF HORTICULTURE (Subsuming intervention under NHM, HMNEH, NBM, NHB, CDB & CIH) (MIDH Operational Guidelines, February 2014: the SUPERSEDED central cost norms, recovered from the Internet Archive)
Horticulture Division, Department of Agriculture & Cooperation, Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India (Krishi Bhavan, New Delhi)
Printed February 2014
“100% of the cost to public sector and 40% of cost for private sector, for meeting the expenditure on infrastructure, as credit linked back ended subsidy.”Read the full clause and reasoning
“Annexure-V ("COST NORMS AND PATTERN OF ASSISTANCE UNDER MISSION FOR INTEGRATED DEVELOPMENT OF HORTICULTURE (MIDH) DURING XII PLAN FOR NHM AND HMNEH SUB SCHEMES"), item "III. Mushrooms" (PDF p.71, the page itself printing the number 64; row iii runs over onto PDF p.72). Verbatim, including the document's own inconsistent rendering of the three cost norms: "i) Production unit | 20 lakh /unit"; "ii) Spawn making unit | Rs. 15 lakh/unit"; "iii) Compost making unit | Rs. 20.00 lakh/unit". All three carry the same Pattern of Assistance: "100% of the cost to public sector and 40% of cost for private sector, for meeting the expenditure on infrastructure, as credit linked back ended subsidy." READ THE HEADING ON THIS DOCUMENT, TWICE. First, its title page is stamped "(DRAFT)" above the title (the only occurrence of that word in all 112 pages), so on its own face this file does not claim to be a final instrument, and this site cites it for provenance, never as an operative rate. Second, it is superseded regardless: the current guideline prices the same three components at Rs 30 lakh / Rs 20 lakh / Rs 30 lakh. It is cited here for one fact only, which its own printed table settles beyond argument: these three figures were a CENTRAL norm, not any state's own schedule. Recovered from the Internet Archive at https://web.archive.org/web/20240414125054id_/http://www.midh.gov.in/pdf/midh_guideline.pdf (capture timestamp 2024-04-14) because the live URL no longer serves it; the capture is the Internet Archive's timestamped record of the exact bytes midh.gov.in itself served at its own guideline URL on that date, which is also why the draft stamp is worth stating plainly rather than treating as disqualifying: whatever the stamp says, this is the file the department was serving as its guideline.”
Annexure-V, item III (PDF p.71, printed page number 64; row iii continues onto PDF p.72). Title page (PDF p.1) for the printed date, the publisher and the "(DRAFT)" stamp.
Read on 13 September 2026 by chirag.
Two things about that document, stated here rather than left in the citation. Its title page is stamped “(DRAFT)”, the only time that word appears in its 112 pages. And we recovered it from the Internet Archive, because the ministry’s own link to it no longer returns the file. Neither changes what it is cited for here, which is not a rate anyone can claim: it is the origin of a number, and on that one point its own printed table is unambiguous.
If the two citations above look like the same document, that is because they nearly are. Both are titled “Operational Guidelines, Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture”. The quickest way to tell them apart is a typing slip: the current one misspells DEVELOPMENT as “DEVELOPMET” on its own cover, and this atlas reproduces that, uncorrected, wherever it quotes the title.
Why we are confident it is a central figure
Because states with no connection to each other print it identically, in documents the centre itself approves. Punjab’s Annual Action Plan for 2021-22, a Government of India planning document, carries a column headed “Maximum permissible cost” and enters ₹20.00 lakh per unit against the production unit, ₹15 lakh against the spawn making unit and ₹20.00 lakh against the compost making unit, split 60% central share and 40% state share. Jharkhand’s plan for 2022-23 prints the same three figures in the same column, under the same split. So does Puducherry’s for 2021-22, where the central share is 100%. West Bengal’s for 2019-20 prints the production unit at the same ₹20.00 lakh and allocates nothing against it. Arunachal Pradesh’s, approved under a different sub-mission altogether and split 90% central to 10% state, prints ₹20.00 lakh too. Not one of those five is a state this page is about, and all five are read and archived here in full. A figure that appears unchanged across unrelated states, under three different funding splits, in documents issued centrally, is a central figure.
Annual Action Plan of 2021-22 for Punjab (Punjab's approved MIDH Annual Action Plan 2021-22, published by the Mission (recovered from the Internet Archive))
Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture, Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Government of India (published on midh.gov.in)
No date is printed on this document.
“Approved component table, headed "Annual Action Plan of 2021-22 for Punjab" / "Action Plan 2021-22 (Rs. in Lakhs)", columns "Activity | Maximum permissible cost | Pattern of Assistance | Phy Target | Fin. Outlay | GOI Share 60% | State Share 40% | ..." Item 5, "Mushrooms", funds…”Read the full clause
“Approved component table, headed "Annual Action Plan of 2021-22 for Punjab" / "Action Plan 2021-22 (Rs. in Lakhs)", columns "Activity | Maximum permissible cost | Pattern of Assistance | Phy Target | Fin. Outlay | GOI Share 60% | State Share 40% | ..." Item 5, "Mushrooms", funds all three components, private sector only: "Production unit" at "Rs. 20.00 lakh/ unit" (Private Sector 10.0 units, 80.00), "Spawn making unit" at "Rs. 15 lakh/ unit" (Private Sector 3.0, 18.00) and "Compost making unit" at "Rs. 20.00 lakh/ unit" (Private Sector 10.0, 80.00), each private row at "40% of cost for private sector, for meeting the expenditure on infrastructure, as credit linked back ended subsidy." and each public row printed at the same cost norm, "100% of the cost.", but funded 0.00; "Sub-total mushrooms" 23.00 units, 178.00 lakh, GOI Share 106.80, State Share 71.20, plus 4.00 units and 29.66 lakh of spill-over. CITED FOR WHICH SCHEME PRICES THIS COMPONENT, NEVER FOR THOSE THREE FIGURES: they are the superseded central norms, not a Punjab schedule. This is in fact the document this atlas cites, on its own page explaining where that older figure came from, as the clearest single proof that it is central rather than any one state's. The current central guideline prices the same three components at Rs 30 lakh, Rs 20 lakh and Rs 30 lakh. Every figure above was confirmed against a rendered page image, not a text layer alone. Recovered from the Internet Archive at https://web.archive.org/web/20240707053959id_/https://midh.gov.in/AAP_2021-22/Punjab%202021-22.pdf (capture timestamp 2024-07-07) because the live URL no longer serves the file: midh.gov.in now answers it with 25,176 bytes of Angular application shell titled "MIDH-Suraksha", at HTTP 200. Two companions archived alongside. content/sources/state-pb-2026-midh-aap-2023-24.pdf ("Punjab : Component wise Physical and Financial Targets - (2023-24)", date of report 20-07-2023, capture timestamp 2023-09-23) drops the three standard components and funds instead "Integrated Mushrooms unit for spawn & compost production", "(a) Public Sector", 3059 units, 120.00 lakh, with 6008.00 units and 119.52 lakh of 2022-23 spill-over, and prints no cost norm for it; recorded as a lead, never as a rule. content/sources/state-pb-2026-midh-aap-2024-25.pdf (date of report 09-07-2024, capture timestamp 2024-07-22) returns to the three standard components, private sector only, at 12, 2 and 10 units and 96.00, 12.00 and 80.00 lakh, also with no cost-norm column. Separately and importantly: Punjab's own "Financial Assistance to Mushroom Cultivation in the State" scheme document is named on the department's archived State Plan Scheme listing but has never been retrieved, live (HTTP 500 on every pass) or archived (zero captures ever), so nothing in this record speaks to it.”
PDF p.6 (item 5, "Mushrooms"); PDF p.3 (the table's title and column headings).
Read on 13 September 2026 by chirag.
What to do if your state’s page shows ₹20 lakh
The records in this atlas that print it are Gujarat, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. If you are in one of them, the useful thing to know is what the number is not. It is not your state’s assessment of what a growing room costs, it is not a ceiling your state has set on you, and it is not a reason to accept ₹8,00,000 when the central guideline in force prices the same component at ₹12,00,000. On the growing rooms alone that is ₹4,00,000, and the spawn lab and the compost yard carry gaps of their own.
OPERATIONAL GUIDELINES MISSION FOR INTEGRATED DEVELOPMET OF HORTICULTURE (MIDH Operational Guidelines 2025)
Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Government of India (published on nhb.gov.in)
Printed 31 December 2024
“Annexure V, item III, Mushroom cultivation”
Read on 11 September 2026 by chirag.
So take the current central guideline to your horticulture office rather than the page you found, and ask which norm your application will be assessed against. This atlas cannot answer that for you, and says so below. What it can do is stop a stale page from being the only figure you have heard. Where this site computes a total for you, it already selects whichever route pays more and shows the other one under “considered, not included”, with its reason.
Himachal Pradesh is a real exception
Himachal Khumb Vikas Yojna (HKVY) 2019-20 also prices a production unit at ₹20 lakh, and it is not one of the pages this article is about. It is a scheme the state government approved in its own right, it funds things the central guideline does not price at all, including a small unit and a fully paid training camp, and its specifications are drawn from the Directorate of Mushroom Research at Solan rather than from any central annexure. A search of its whole guideline for MIDH, NHM or National Horticulture returns nothing. Its ₹20 lakh is a coincidence of arithmetic, not an inheritance.
Guidelines for Himachal Khumb Vikas Yojna (HKVY) 2019-20 (Himachal Khumb Vikas Yojna (HKVY), Guidelines 2019-20)
Department of Horticulture, Government of Himachal Pradesh
No date is printed on this document.
“"Cost Norms and pattern of assistance for Himachal Khumb Vikas Yojna" table, PDF p.6 (page image, not the OCR text layer, which misreads several figures, see comment above).”
PDF p.6 (rate table); pp.1-2 (approval letters, dated); p.3 (guideline cover, undated)
Read on 12 September 2026 by chirag.
What we cannot tell you, and will not guess
When the central norm changed. This atlas holds two central guidelines, the one in force and the one it replaced, and not the revisions in between. A page showing ₹20 lakh was accurate on the day it was written, and we have no basis for saying how long ago that was for any particular state.
What your state pays today. Every figure above is what a document prints, not a confirmation of current practice. Several of these state records are marked on this site as read but not confirmed current, for exactly that reason. Nothing here says a department has been negligent, and nothing here should be read that way.