The Maharashtra government on 11 June 2017 announced a loan waiver for farmers.
It decided to form a committee to decide the criteria for debt relief, after which cultivators called off their protests.
The move is expected to benefit 1.07 crore farmers in the state, who have land holdings of less than five acres.
A discussion between the government of Maharashtra and representatives of farmers have reached a consensus and farmers have called off the strike.
With this, Maharashtra became the first state to offer loan waiver to farmers. The loans of the small and marginal farmers were waived with immediate effect.
The decision was made that the benefits of the waiver will be provided only to those farmers who are dependent only on farm produce.
The benefits of the loan waiver will not apply for political leaders, businessman and salaried person.
On the real farmers will be benefitted from the scheme of waiving the farm loans.
A separate committee will be formed to fix criteria based on which further waiver will be sanctioned.
Besides, the ministers’ group has decided to restart fresh loan disbursal to farmers from 12 June 2017.
The state government has also accepted the demand of farmers to increase the milk prices.
The milk societies will have to agree with 70:30 formula (70 per cent of selling amount to farmers, 30 per cent to the distribution chain) of profit sharing on the lines of the sugar industry.
Devendra Fadnavis, CM of Maharashtra had earlier formed a six-member high power committee led by senior BJP minister Chandrakant Patil to look into various demands of farmers, including a loan waiver. The panel was asked to submit its report to the state government after holding discussions with farmers’ leaders.
