HUBBALLI: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said on Wednesday that he would lead a delegation of leaders of all parties to knock on the doors of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and seek his intervention in view of the drought situation and increasing number of cases of farmer suicides.
He told the media after meeting families of farmers who committed suicide that the state government has commenced a survey of districts which received scanty rainfall this year, adding that several taluks would be declared drought-hit soon. He assured early implementation of inter-state Kalasa-Banduri irrigation project with the intervention of Mr Modi.
“The state government has written to the Prime Minister’s office to finalise the date to discuss with all-party delegation the issue of farmer suicides, pending irrigation projects and financial assistance required for it. We are expected to go after August 10. All bottlenecks for Kalasa-Banduri project will be cleared soon,” he added.
The Chief Minister said the state government has implemented the announcement made by former CM Jagadish Shettar to waive around Rs 2,500 crore loans of farmers.
Making a fervent appeal to farmers not to end their lives because of debt crop loss, he said the government would extend all other assistance including compensation, and crop insurance to distressed farmers. He met families of five farmers in Gadag and Dharwad districts, offered his condolences and handed over an ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakhs to each family.
Meanwhile, several farmers expressed their ire against him in Janthli village of Mundaragi taluk for not taking any measures to stop farmer suicides. Terming Siddaramaiah’s visit to the affected farmer families as mere eyewash, villagers charged that the Chief Minister’s tour was a just political gimmick and the move was an attempt to escape the wrath of Opposition parties.
Several farmer leaders expressed their displeasure against the Chief Minister as he spent more than two hours in a programme of Gadag medical college while sparing only a couple of minutes to console the kin of farmers who committed suicide.
Crop loan waiver will wreck state finances
Given the current financial position, the state government is not in a position to waive interest on agricultural loans borrowed by farmers from co-operative and commercial banks let alone writing off the entire loan.
A senior minister in the Siddaramaiah government told Deccan Chronicle that farmers had borrowed Rs 15,000 crore from co-operative banks and around Rs 21,000 crore from commercial banks. Put together it would be around Rs 36,000 crore and the government cannot think of waiving this amount when it is scrambling to mobilise resources owing to poor revenue collection in several sectors. Even waiving of interest on loans taken by farmers in the current fiscal would come to Rs 1,500 crore which would be an additional burden on the exchequer.
“I do not know in what context Chief Minister Siddaramaiah stated that the government will examine waiving agricultural loans. I will discuss this with him soon after he returns to Bengaluru.” Admitting that it would set a bad precedent, the minister said the government was shelling out around Rs 925 crore to sugarcane growers as incentive due for the year 2013-14 as sugar mill owners had refused to pay.
State finances would be definitely under stress if the CM agrees to waive interest on crop loans. It was not a joke to write off loans borrowed from co-operative banks, it would cost the exchequer around Rs 15,000 crore.
This would benefit defaulting farmers and not genuine ryots who promptly repay debts to get fresh loans. He said the government had been offering interest-free loans to small and marginal farmers. In view of a surge in farmer suicides, instructions have been given to all banks not to pressure farmers to repay loans. Even loan repayment has been restructured for the benefit of farmers.
The minister felt the Centre’s intervention was the only solution to the current problem. The previous UPA-II government had waived off Rs 73,000 crore crop loans of farmers owing to poor rainfall and crop loss a few years ago. A similar step had to be taken by the NDA government led by BJP, he said.
