Minister contradicts CM, says can’t meet November 25 target

Mumbai: In contradiction to chief minister Devendra Fadnavis’s statement, revenue minister Chandrakant Patil accepted that implementation of the farmers’ loan waiver scheme will take a minimum of 15 more days. Earlier, Mr Fadnavis, while speaking to The Asian Age, had assured that the process would be completed by November 25.

Mr Patil also chairs the Cabinet sub-committee looking after the loan waiver. The scheme has been under fire for confusion in implementation for the past few weeks. The Maharashtra government has set the latest deadline for completion of transfer of money as November 25. Recently, when principal secretary for IT, Vijay Kumar Gautam, went on leave, Mr Fadnavis confirmed the deadline again. “Technical hurdles are over now. We will complete the process by November 25,” the CM said.

Contrary to his claims however, Mr Patil clarified that the process would take an additional 15 days. In Osmanabad on Wednesday, Mr Patil said, “The process of waiving off loans is going on. There are a few issues. But the government is not responsible for them. In the next 15 days, implementation will be over.”

The state government started transferring money to farmers’ accounts on October 18 i.e. the eve of Diwali. The government plans to finish the work by November 15. However, technical issues like similar Aadhaar card numbers against several farmers’ names etc. have delayed the process. Due to the mess, the government has extended the deadline till November 25.

The Maharashtra government had declared a Rs 34,022 crore loan waiver scheme for 89 lakh farmers in the last week of June. Since then, the process of claiming loan waiver, filling online forms, and the subsequent confusion have dominated headlines.