Maharashtra govt has no record of Mumbai farmers

Moneylife: Mumbai: Saturday, August 12, 2017.

Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis while announcing loan waiver scheme for farmers had said that there were 813 beneficiaries from Mumbai. However, the state government has no record of any such farmer covered under the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Farmers’ Welfare Scheme in Mumbai city and Mumbai suburbs, reveals a reply received under the Right to Information (RTI) Act.

According to information received by activist Anil Galgali from the Public Information Officer (PIO) of Cooperation, Marketing and Textiles Department, "the government receives information from the State level Bankers Committee and according to that information, 694 farmers from Mumbai city have outstanding loans amounting to Rs45.04 crore and 119 farmers from Mumbai suburbs have a outstanding loans amounting to Rs0.12 crore on the basis of assumption. The government does not have the list of farmers with their names and the list is with the bankers."

Galgali says, the state government, which had announced the loan waiver scheme for farmers had recently released the list of names of the beneficiaries. He says, “I too had apprehension about the presence of farmers in Mumbai, hence I sought the information from the government.”    

"The government does not have any list on its records and without cross verification and due diligence by the authorities, CM Fadnavis was given the data on assumption is a very serious lapse in the administration front," Galgali says.

In July, the CM released list of beneficiary farmers on Twitter that included 694 farmers from Mumbai and 119 from Mumbai suburbs. These were the farmers from a list of beneficiaries eligible for the Rs34,000 crore loan waiver scheme announced by the state government.