Loan Waiver For Farmers Still In Progress: Thummala

Telangana Agriculture Minister Thummala Nageswara Rao revealed today that the loan waiver process for farmers was still going on.

He also announced that a detailed review meeting concerning loans exceeding Rs 2 lakh would be held after the Dasara festival.

During a face-to-face interaction with Congress workers and the general public at Gandhi Bhavan, the minister claimed that the State government had waived Rs 25,000 crore in farmer loans within just 10 months.

At the event, the public submitted 95 petitions to the minister, addressing various issues such as land disputes, employment, pensions, and housing under the Indiramma scheme.

The minister assured the attendees that he would address some of the issues immediately, in consultation with the various district Collectors. He added that people were drawn to Gandhi Bhavan because they believed their problems could be resolved there, and that that would indeed be the case.

Thummala criticized the previous BRS government for driving the State into a financial crisis, to the extent that it could not even pay salaries to its employees. "Despite these challenges, the Congress government has provided significant relief to the farmers, and has also continued the Rythu Bhima scheme which the previous administration failed to implement," he claimed.

He also expressed frustration with the Union government's neglect of the Swaminathan Commission's recommendations on increasing the Minimum Support Price (MSP). Thummala asked whether the BRS and BJP had forgotten their anti-farmer policies, hypocritically accusing BRS leaders of misleading the public with empty promises.

"Farmers have nothing to worry about. The ones who are anxious are those who lost power and are eager to regain it," the minister said.