BJP to shift focus to compensation for rain-hit farmers in state

After raising the Veer Savarkar remark controversy, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is now planning to corner the government on the issue of farmers.

After raising the Veer Savarkar remark controversy, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is now planning to corner the government on the issue of farmers.

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Shifting its strategy from national to state issues, the BJP plans to initiate a discussion on the governor’s speech, with Opposition leader Devendra Fadnavis likely to lead the charge against the Thackeray-led government on the issue of providing compensation to farmers due to unseasonal rain and blanket loan waiver.

Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari had announced an interim relief of ₹8,000 for up to two hectares of affected kharif crops and ₹18,000 for up to two hectares of horticulture or perennial crops. He had also waived school fees for children from farmers; families during the President’s rule. Nearly 93 lakh hectares of crop was damaged due to unseasonal rain, affecting 1 crore farmers. The BJP plans to corner Thackeray over his announcement that affected farmers should get compensation of ₹25,000 per hectare as opposed to ₹8,500 per hectare. “This announcement was made by Thackeray, so it is expected that the government delivers on it. In the supplementary demands, the government has budgeted a paltry ₹750 crore to meet additional expenses for unseasonal rain compensation. To give relief of ₹25,000 crore per hectare, the government will have to a budget ₹23,000 crore and for a blanket loan waiver, they need as much ₹70,000 crore,” said Fadnavis.

The three parties had through the last couple of years put pressure on the ruling BJP to announce a blanket loan waiver, even as the BJP had tried to point out that it was not feasible.

CM Uddhav Thackeray, who expects the Opposition’s attack, at a party gathering in Nagpur, said his government would deliver on its promise. “We are committed to a loan waiver and don’t need to be reminded. Our priority will be to resolve issues of farmers,” said Thackeray .

The ruling government, however, plans to first table a white paper on state finances and examine how to deliver on its loan waiver promise.

“We don’t know the state of finances under BJP regime. We would like to bring this before public and then take a call on how the money should be raised or what can be modalities of the loan waiver,” said a state minister.