The Karnataka Congress-JDS coalition government is now part of a huge controversy after it took away the loan-waiver deposits from the account of the beneficiaries which were deposited before the elections. This move comes after the Congress-JDS coalition lost in the Lok Sabha elections.
According to the reports, nearly 13,988 farmers across Karnataka were shocked to find that the money which was earlier deposited in their accounts towards the loan waiver has been withdrawn after the JDS-Congress coalition government lost in the Lok Sabha elections.
The farmers who have been allegedly cheated are up in arms, saying that the Congress-JDS state government deposited the money to lure them at the time of the elections and withdrew it after they lost it.
Shivappa, a 60-year-old farmer from Sagar in Yadgir district, was one of those farmers who is now cheated by the government. Shivappa was the beneficiary of Rs 43,553, which was directly deposited to his account in April as part of the state’s farm loan waiver promise. But on June 3, weeks after the Lok Sabha elections were declared, the money has now disappeared from Shivappa’s account.
However, the government denied the reports and said they were “mere lies and speculation” being spread by the opposition parties. Pushing the blame on the centre, Kumaraswamy on Tuesday said that the gaffe was committed by nationalised banks which are directly under the Centre’s control.
“I’ve called a meeting with representatives of nationalised banks on June 14 to discuss this specific issue,” said CM Kumaraswamy.
Munish Moudgil, the commissioner of Survey, Settlement and Land Records who is in charge of the implementation of the waiver scheme, said the discrepancies occurred only in nationalised banks where 12 lakh farmers had applied for the loan waiver. He added that the government had released Rs 3,930 crore to 7.5 lakh eligible farmers after the necessary scrutiny of the data provided by the banks.
The Karnataka government has now claimed that an audit report suggested that it was found that the banks had earlier deposited money in 13,988 accounts of ineligible farmers and were directed to recover Rs.59.8 crore.
The Karnataka government had made a promise to waive-off farm loans as soon as it came to power in the state. However, soon after it came to power, it failed to do so leading to loss of lives of many farmers in the state. Several farmers have also been issued notices after they failed to repay farm loans taken in various banks.
Karnataka state government itself had admitted that Rs 44,000 crore loan waiver had helped only 800 farmers in the state. They had confirmed that only a few of the farmers had benefited from the so-called ‘loan-waiver’.
