Govt has no plans to waive farm loans, says Santosh Kumar Gangwar

No proposal under consideration of the union government to waive loans of farmers of the country

The government has no plans to waive farm loans but there are schemes to reduce costs by timely repayment of the amount borrowed, the government said in Parliament on Tuesday. “There is no proposal under consideration to waive loans of farmers. To reduce the debt burden, major initiatives have been taken,” Minister of State for Finance Santosh Kumar Gangwar said in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha.

Farmers are given loans at reduced rate of seven per cent for crop loans of up to Rs 3 lakh under the department of agriculture, cooperative & farmers’ welfare with an interest subvention scheme.

Under the scheme, additional subvention of three per cent is given to those farmers who repay their short-term crop loan in time, thereby reducing the effective rate of interest to four per cent per annum for such farmers, he said.