H D Kumaraswamy : Govt. should waive short-term loans of farmers

BENGALURU: JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswamy on Friday demanded that the government also waive short-term loans of farmers who had paid their dues instead of helping only those who had outstanding loans.

Kumaraswamy said he had received a lot of calls from farmers who said that they had repaid the loans before June 20 by borrowing money from private lenders at a high interest rate. “Now these people have not got fresh loans and they have repaid the money. This concerns less than 5% of farmers. Let government extend `50,000 waiver to these farmers too.”

While commending the government for finally coming forward to waive some amount of the loans, he said it was not pressure mounted by BJP that forced the government to announce the waiver, but AICC Vice President Rahul Gandhi.  “As far as I know, he is the only person Siddaramaiah listens to. Only if the instructions come from him will Siddaramaiah listen.”

 “He (Yeddyurappa) never wanted to consider loan waiver and the only reason BJP announced it later was to win elections,” he said. Criticising Naidu, Kumaraswamy asked, “If farmers get a waiver, then it is fashion, but if corporate loans are restructured, then what would you call it? So according to them, corporate loan write off is socialism, while farmer loan waiver is capitalism.”