MVA’S first...

The scheme has now been expanded to include a one-time settlement scheme for farmers with outstanding dues of more than ₹2 lakh and ₹50,000 as incentive for those who repaid their loans on time. However, no budgetary allocation has been specified for the increased ambit of the scheme. The scheme initially had promised to waive off loans of up to ₹2 lakh for an estimated 30 lakh small farmers (35 lakh loan accounts). For this year, Pawar allocated ₹7,000 crore for this scheme, while the supplementary budget presented in this session itself for 2019-20 had provided another ₹15,000 crore under this head. Besides the loan waiver, farmers have been promised a new solar pump scheme, which aims at setting up 5 lakh pumps in the next five years. The scheme has been promised ₹10,000 crore over five years and allocated ₹670 crore this year. Overall allocation for agriculture and allied sectors is ₹16,333 crore. The irrigation sector has been allocated ₹11,897 crores this year as per the annual plan to complete pending irrigation projects, promote water conservation, among others.

“We estimate a spending of around ₹15,000 crore or more on the farm-loan waiver after its expanded scope. This expenditure will be allocated in the supplementary budget in July. Several other schemes, where allocation has not been finalised, will also be included in the supplementary budget. The reason is that the actual financial costs of these schemes are yet to be fully ascertained,’’ said a senior finance department official.

The budget also outlined a new Maharashtra Apprenticeship Scheme to give training and internship facilities to unemployed youth in the age group of 21 to 28 years. The scheme promises a government-paid stipend – ₹60,000 — behind every candidate per year – for getting skills training in private and governmentaided institutes. The scheme will kick off from August 15 and will cost the state ₹6,000 crore over five years.

By announcing sops for farmers and unemployed youth, the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government has delivered on two core promises made in its manifestos, ahead of the state Assembly polls.

“Overall, we have tried to consider every section of the society, mainly farmers, but also youth and women. The state is witnessing an economic slowdown and every industry is facing challenges, so we have tried to give some concession to the industry as well, such as the stamp-duty cut for real-estate sector or electricity-duty cut for industry,” said Pawar.

In his speech, he pointed a finger at his predecessors for the state of the public exchequer. “During the past five years, the state has raised loans of ₹2.82 lakh crore and total outstanding debt and liabilities as on January 2020 is ₹4.33 lakh crore,’’ said Pawar. He pointed out that the last government had increased government guarantees from ₹7,709 crore in 2014 to ₹46,891 crore now and cost of infrastructure projects undertaken stood at ₹2.78 lakh crore. “The state government has to also bear the direct and indirect liability of these projects,’’ he said.

Despite this, the budget has feel-good announcements. Some of these include ₹500 crore (for next five years) for Mumbai’s tourism, purchasing 1,600 new state transport buses (₹401 crore), women police stations in every district, slash in electricity duty to promote industries from 9.3% to 7.5%, ₹150 crore for CM’S pet scheme to provide subsidized food (Shiv Bhojan thali), among others.

And some announcements have been made without any budgetary backing, only to outline a road map. For instance, taking a leaf from the Delhi government, Pawar announced a scheme to construct 1400 ‘Adarsh’ or ideal ‘state-of-the-art’ public schools worth ₹5,000 crore (with help of external aid) and another externally aided scheme to modernise primary health centres, again worth ₹5,000 crore. Similarly, Mumbai has been promised an international tourism complex across 14 acres in Worli Dairy Complex,includingaworld-class aquarium worth ₹1,000 crore.

Meanwhile, the Opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), remained unimpressed with former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, terming the Thackeray government’s first budget “disappointing, depressing and anti-development’’. “There is nothing for farmers, youth or our sisters or any section of the society. Instead of presenting a budget in the Assembly, the finance minister gave a public speech meant for a rally. There was no analysis of the financial situation and there were no new schemes. That petrol and diesel hike will hit our farmers the most,’’ said Fadnavis.

Rupesh Kir, co-ordinator for Samarthan, an organisation that analyses state budgets, said, “A scrutiny of budget documents and figures tells a story completely different from the speech. For the past few years, we have noticing huge gap between actual spending vis-a-vis budgetary allocations vis-a-vis announcements. This year, too, it seems like much of what has been announced will never be implemented. As it is, many announcements are not backed with funds.’’

Farmers’ leader and agrarian expert Ajit Nawale, however, said that the budget has tried to do some justice to farmers. “They have expanded the loan-waiver scheme and provided ₹22,000 crore for it so far. They have promised 5 lakh solar pumps to farmers and said they will extend subsidies for drip irrigation. But, more was expected via crop insurance scheme for farmers, assistance for group farming or farmer producer companies, price stabilisation fund for crops, among others,’’said Nawale, of left-aligned All India Kisan Sabha.