HYDERABAD: Telangana CM A Revanth Reddy announced the fourth phase of the state’s farm loan waiver Saturday. The latest tranche will cover 3.1 lakh farmers and cost state exchequer Rs 2,747 crore.
In the first three phases of the waiver, Telangana had spent nearly Rs 18,000 crore and covered 22.2 lakh farmers. With the latest announcement, the state’s total expenditure will reach Rs 21,000 crore and cover more than 25 lakh farmers. The move comes at a time when both BRS and BJP have made an issue out of lakhs of farmers not being covered by the initial waiver.
Revanth announced the fourth phase from the stage of farmers’ festival (Rythu Panduga) public meeting in Mahbubnagar, organised to mark Congress govt completing one year in office on Dec 7. The latest waiver started Saturday with cheques being handed out to farmers at the public meeting.
Crop loans up to Rs 1 lakh were waived on July 18, followed by loans up to Rs 1.5 lakh on July 30, and finally, loans up to Rs 2 lakh were cleared on Aug 15. The fourth phase covers all three categories of farmers.
Since Independence, Telangana was the only state in country to have waived crop loans worth Rs 21,000 crore in less than a year, said Revanth. He challenged PM Modi, former CM K Chandrasekhar Rao, and serving CMs of other states to come for a debate on the issue if they disagreed with him.
Revanth said: “We promised and delivered with the blessings of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. Let BJP and BRS members come to the assembly or Mahbubnagar. We will tell them how successive Congress govts always stood by farmers. The state produced a record 1.5 crore metric tonne paddy without a drop of water from Kaleshwaram project. But BRS is saying Congress did not have the right to hold a farmers’ festival.”
Revanth said the previous KCR govt implemented crop loan waiver of only up to Rs 1 lakh in four instalments in its first term. “From 2018 to 2023, BRS promised another Rs 1 lakh waiver, but did not do it for the first four years. It was only in the last year of their second term that they sold the Outer Ring Road and deposited Rs 11,000 crore into farmers’ accounts. Of the Rs 11,000 crore, Rs 8,596 crore went towards interest due to delay in waiving off loans. The actual waiver of crop loan was only Rs 2,500 crore,” he alleged.
He added that he and deputy CM Bhatti Vikramarka had decided to waive crop loans in the first year itself to ensure that farmers get the waiver and the money would not go towards interest.