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Maharashtra : loan waiver scheme to individual farmers
Why in the news ?
- The Maharashtra government has expanded the scope of the loan waiver scheme by extending the benefits to every member of the farmer's family in case of a separate loan account.
- Till now, the State government has spent Rs.14,000 crore on the scheme.
- The government also claimed that the scheme had so far benefitted 35.32 lakh farmers in the state.
Details
- The decision had been announced by the government the recently concluded monsoon session of the State Legislature.
- Earlier, the state government had considered the farmer's family as one unit and considered it eligible to claim a waiver of Rs 1.50 lakh agricultural debt.
- As per the new GR, every member of the family having some agricultural debt will now be covered under the scheme, which was announced last year following strident protests by farmers.
- Now, each individual with an outstanding agricultural loan will be covered in the scheme, and up to Rs.1.5 lakh will be waived by the government.
- As per the initial scheme, if a farmer had a loan outstanding of more than Rs 1.50 lakh, then that difference has to be paid by him before he becomes eligible for the waiver.
- As per the revised rule, the farmers who have paid some money to the bank as per the first scheme but the cumulative amount of the outstanding loan is less than the revised norms; then the banks will have to return the amount to farmers.
- For instance, as per the earlier scheme, if a farmer family had had a cumulative loan outstanding of Rs two lakh and Rs 50,000 had already been paid by them, the state would bear the burden of Rs 1.50 lakh.
- As per the revised norms, the paid amount of Rs 50,000 will have to be returned to the family because everyone in the family is entitled for loan waiver now.
Source
The Hindu