Maharashtra expands scope of farm loan waiver

Shiv Kumar
Tribune News Service
Mumbai, July 21

The Maharashtra Government has expanded the scope of the farm loan waiver scheme by allowing individuals instead of entire families to avail of the scheme. 

As per the assurance given by Minister for Co-operation Subhash Deshmukh in the state assembly at Nagpur on Friday, multiple members of a family can have farm loans up to Rs 1.5 lakh waived following the state government's decision. So a farmer and his wife each can have Rs 1.5 lakh of farm loans waived where earlier only one of them was eligible for the waiver, officials of the co-operation department said.

The Maharashtra Government had rolled out the Rs 34,000 crore farm loan waiver scheme called the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Shetkari Sanmaan Yojna in June 2017, but various conditions in the scheme ensured that the waiver amounted to less than half the amount.

To avail of the waiver of Rs 1.5 lakh each applicants will have to first clear the rest of their loans taken from financial institutions, according to officials.

A detailed notification on the modified farm loan waiver scheme will be released next week, according to officials.

An additional five lakh farmers are expected to become eligible to apply for the waiver which could cost the  exchequer a further amount of Rs 1000 crore, according to state government officials.