Mumbai: The State government has received 48 lakh applications for the Rs. 34,000-crore farm loan waiver scheme, including 14,000 applications from Mumbai, Secretary (Information Technology) V.K. Gautam said. Interestingly, there are applications from other States as well, including Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Karnataka, he said. “We will do a thorough scrutiny to short-list those eligible for the waiver,” Mr. Gautam said.
Following protests by the Opposition, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis had announced an inquiry into the high number of applications from farmers. The government has set up 25,000 centres for farmers to register for the scheme, which will continue till mid-September. The first list of the eligible farmers will be announced by September 30.
He said nearly 80% of the applications receivd till July 24 were forwarded for processing to various State government departments. Topping the list were Jalgaon farmers with 2.86 lakh applications. Around 2.46 lakh applications were received from Ahmednagar, 1.8 lakh from Aurangabad, 1.59 lakh from Beed, 1.16 lakh from Buldhana, 1.09 lakh from Chandrapur and 1.01 lakh from Jalna. Maharashtra is the fourth State after U.P., Karnataka and Punjab to announce farm loan waivers. With over ₹4 lakh crore in debts, a recent report by India Ratings warned that the loan waiver scheme will push the State’s fiscal deficit to 2.71% of the GSDP in 2017-18.
