Rajasthan govt postpones ‘loan waiver’ camps for farmers

JAIPUR: Eager to gain political mileage from the loan waiver announced for farmers in the election year, the state government seems struggling with arranging its finances. The state government on Thursday deferred the camps for distribution of loan waiver certificates, which were to be held on Saturday and Monday. The first camp will be now organised in Banswara on May 31.
According to the sources, chief minister Vasundhara Raje herself wants to come out and distribute the ‘loan waiver’ certificates to the farmers personally. “She is going to Banswara to distribute the certificates on May 31. Thereafter similar camps would be organised across the state,” said an official with the state cooperative department on Thursday “We have waived off a loan of nearly Rs 8,000 crore for more than 29,30,000 farmers in the state. In Banswara district alone nearly a loan waiver of Rs 250 crore is given to the farmers,” said Ajay Singh Kilak, state cooperatives minister in an official release.
The state cooperatives department, on the lines of the neighbouring Madhya Pradesh, has listed out eight categories of farmers, who will not get benefits of loan waiver. “These include farmers who are affluent including employees of the state or the central government, elected as MPs or MLAs, chairmen of municipal corporations and others.
The state government on Wednesday agreed to offer a bank guarantee for taking loan of Rs 5,000 crore from banks to keep its promise of loan waiver to farmers of the state. Rajasthan cooperatives minister Ajay Singh Kilak said, “We will get Rs 5,000 crore from banks. We will get 60 per cent funds from refinance that apex banks get from Nabard and 40 per cent from cooperative banks. The government has given bank guarantee.’’ He added that in a meeting of a group of ministers held on Thursday the chief minister desired to distribute certificates to farmers during her public address in Banswara district on May 31.
During her last Budget speech, Raje had announced a one time loan wavier of up to Rs 50,000 for small and marginal farmers along with a budgetary provision of Rs 2,000 crore for the same. After a lot of hue and cry by the opposition Congress, the government introduced a third category of farmers which have land and are sowing more than small and marginal farmers.