Digital platform to help needy farmers: Fadnavis

The Maharashtra government will ensure with the help of a digital platform that only needy farmers benefit from its loan waiver scheme, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis (pictured) has said.

Fadnavis said his dispensation took the decision in view of “the big scam” which occurred in Maharashtra after the then United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre wrote off debts in 2008, which, he said, deprived distressed peasants of the benefits intended for them.

The Maharashtra CM said the state government had formed a joint committee which would work out within a week conditions to ensure who should benefit from the waiver. He suggested that farmers who were financially better off and professionals and government employees also into farming be left out of the scheme.

Fadnavis observed the waiver — announced on June 11 after a widespread farmers' agitation — would further stress the debt-ridden state, as his government would require to raise ~25,000 crore or more for this.

"But it can be managed," he said at a recent interaction organised by BJP's 'Good Governance' department here.

He said implementing the relief measure would "take some time" and added the government might create "some financing instrument" to tackle the situation after the waiver.

Fadnavis also said decisions by Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh to waive farmers’ loans in their states led Maharashtra peasants to demand similar relief, which prompted his dispensation to announce the waiver.

He ruled out speculation that the move would cause prices to rise in the state and elsewhere.