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Maharastra govt farm loan waiver, crop loss sops to cost Rs 37,000 crore

Proposes to replace BJP govt’s Jalyukta Shivar Abhiyan with CM Water Conservation Scheme

Maha Vikas Aghadi goverment, MVA, Maha Vikas Aghadi first budget, Maha Vikas Aghadi budget, Maha Vikas Aghadi goverment Budget, highlights, Maha vikas Aghadi crop loan waiver, Mahatma Jyotirao Phule crop loan waiver scheme, mumbai news, india news, indian express (From left) MoS Finance Shambhuraj Desai, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Finance Minister Ajit Pawar on Friday. (Photo by Ganesh Shirsekar)

The Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, which presented its first budget in the state Assembly Friday, has made a provision of

Rs 37,000 crore towards crop loan waiver and compensation for crop loss. It has also proposed to replace the Devendra Fadnavis government’s flagship ‘Jalyukt Shivar Abhiyan’ that sought to make Maharashtra a drought-free state by 2019 with its own Chief Minister Water Conservation Scheme, and allocated Rs 450 crore to rejuvenate 8,000 old structures and create additional water storage facilities in the state.

Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, who also holds the finance portfolio, while presenting the budget said emphasis has been made on the critical agriculture and irrigation sectors. “The government has made a provision of Rs 22,000 crore for the Mahatma Jyotirao Phule Shetkari Karjmukti Yojna. An additional provision of Rs 15,000 crore is also being made to accommodate farmers under the extended loan waiver scheme and repay compensation for crop loss,” Pawar said.

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The Mahatma Jyotirao Phule crop loan waiver scheme, announced in December 2019 and enforced from March this year, aims to write off crop loans up to Rs 2 lakh pending as on September 30, 2019.

While the outlay for the scheme for the current fiscal was 15,000 crore, a provision of Rs 7,000 crore has been proposed for the scheme for 2020-21, Pawar said.

Festive offer

“The funds for the loan waiver are being transferred to the loan accounts of farmers. Till today, Rs 9,035 crore have been transferred to the accounts of 13.85 lakh farmers,” the state finance minister told the Assembly. The remaining amount, he said, will be transferred to the accounts of the eligible farmers before the kharif season of 2020, so that they will be eligible for the new crop loans.

The MVA government has also expanded the scope of the loan waiver by offering Rs 50,000 incentive through one-time settlement (OTS) scheme to farmers who are non-defaulters.

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“Under the scheme, farmers who will regularly repay loans till June 30, 2020, will get a benefit of Rs 50,000 for the crop loan taken in 2018-19, and if the amount taken is less than Rs 50,000, then the farmer will be given an incentive equal to the loan amount taken in 2018-19,” Pawar said.

Pawar said the Centre had approved Rs 956.13 crore to be paid as compensation to farmers who faced crop loss due to flood-like situation in July-August last year and untimely rainfall in October-November. The finance minister said the state had demanded
Rs 14,496 crore for the purpose from the Centre. He indicated that Rs 15,000 crore, necessary for expanded loan waiver and crop loss, would be provided to farmers by the state government.

Reiterating the MVA government’s commitment to sustainable irrigation, Pawar said, an outlay of Rs 10,235 crore has been proposed for the completion of 313 irrigation projects. With the total amount necessary for the completion of these projects estimated at Rs 1 lakh crore, the government is contemplating alternative options to expedite irrigation projects.

While the government has retained the Fadnavis government’s Rs 10,000-crore Marathwada Water Grid project, it has proposed to rework it. In the first phase, the government plans to supply water through Ujjain and Jayakwadi dams to some talukas in Osmanabad, Latur and Aurangabad districts that are facing severe water scarcity. For this purpose, an outlay of Rs 200 crore has been proposed for 2020-21.

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Under Jal Jeevan Mission, Rs 1,234 crore has been provided for rural drinking water.

A total of five lakh agricultural solar pumps will be set up over the next five years at a total cost of Rs 10,000 crore, for which a provision of Rs 670 crore has been proposed in the 2020-21 budget.

A subsidy scheme of 80 percent to small and marginal farmers for drip irrigation for crops will be extended across the state, which is currently restricted to few drought-hit talukas. Pawar said the government also intended to bring sugarcane cultivation across the state under drip irrigation system in the next three to four years.

The government has also announced an innovative energy park at Koradi (Nagpur), a new agriculture college at Sakoli (Bhandara district) and a cashew processing industry with Rs 15 crore allocation in Konkan region.

First uploaded on: 07-03-2020 at 02:16 IST
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