PM announces relief for farmers

NEW DELHI: As a one-time measure to mitigate farmers'' hardship, Government has decided to waive completely the first year''s deferred liability of interest on Kharif loans, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee announced in Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
Making a suo-moto statement in Parliament, the Prime Minister said "such of our citizens as having availed of this facility shall be entitled to obtain an endorsement of this waiver directly from their loaning bank."
Appropriate guidelines in this regard will be issued by the Reserve Bank of India, Vajpayee said.
Vajpayee said he had earlier announced that the current year''s interest on both the kharif crop loan and agricultural term loans would be deferred and the loans proper would be rescheduled into term loans to be recovered over the next five years in case of small and marginal farmers and three years for other farmers.
In addition, interests for one year, on both these types of loans, amounting to Rs.6040 crore, having been deferred, was to be spread out over several years as a liability, he said.
Referring to the acute shortage of water, particularly in drought-hit areas of Rajasthan, the Prime Minister said he had instructed the Railway Ministry to run additional water tanker trains, in part, to mitigate this critical deficiency.
The Ministry of Water Resoruces will immediately appoint a task force to assist the affected states in this regard, he said.
He was also instructing the Petroleum Ministry to examine the possibility of deep drilling rigs being employed for sinking deep tube wells, Vajpayee said, adding "we will meet the challenge of this drought unitedly and shall ensure that the difficulties of our citizens are mitiagated."
As for Agricultural Input Subsidy (AIS), the Government has already announced a grant of this to small and marginal farmers amounting to over Rs 1490 crore, Vajpayee said.
"In view, however, of the severity of the drought, I have decided that this AIS will now now be extended further, to cover all other farmers too, both the sown and unsown areas, up to a ceiling of two hectares, as a one-time measure and in relaxation of existing guidelines," he said.
On the basis of assessment to be made by Ministry of Agriculture, in consultation with the Finance Ministry, all the fourteen affected states would receive additional amounts, based on actual land holding and cultivation patterns, he said.
These states would, therefore, now now receive in excess of a further Rs.555 crore, for combating drought, to be met from either the Calamity Relief Fund or the National Calamity Contingency Fund, the Prime Minister said.
For cattle, further additional amount of Rs.25 crore would now now be provided to Animal Husbandry Department for support to such ''gaushalas'' (cowsheds) having more than 1000 heads of cattle, Vajpayee said.
Releases may be permitted directly to Non-Governmental organisations running such ''gaushalas'', he said, adding a committeee comprising officers from Animal Husbandry Department, Ministry of Finance and PMO would authorise such releases, in tandem with like and simultaneous disbursements from PM''s Relief Fund.
Recalling that the Government had earlier approved additional assistance of Rs.70 crore for cattle care in Rajasthan, he said he had also sanctioned free transportation of cattle-grade feed and fodder and water to State Governments till June 2003.