Telangana Rashtra Samithi president and chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Friday announced waiver of all crop loans up to Rs 1 lakh taken by farmers before December 11 last, when the results for the state assembly elections were announced.
KCR presented the vote-on-account budget in the state assembly in the capacity of finance minister, for the first time.
He said since the Central government had presented vote-on-account budget, there was no clarity on the future policies of the Centre.
“Hence, the state government also has gone for vote on account budget. After the elections and Centre’s budget, state government would be presenting the budget,” he said.
KCR made a budgetary allocation of Rs 20,107 crore for agriculture. He said as promised before the recent elections, all crop loans till December 11, 2018, to the tune of Rs 1 lakh would be waived off and for this, the government has allocated Rs 6,000 crore in the current budget. The loan waiver would be done in a phased manner.
He said under the Rythu Bandhu scheme, the financial assistance has been s increased from Rs 4000 to Rs 5000 per acre per season, as promised before the elections. An amount of Rs 12,000 crore has been allocated for the same. Similarly, an amount of Rs 283 crore was allocated under Rythu Beema.
“These two schemes infused a lot of confidence among the farmers,” he said.
The other major allocations are: Kalyana Lakshmi- Rs 1,450 crore, Unemployment allowance Rs 1,810 crore, for SC welfare Rs 16,581 crore, for ST welfare Rs 9,825 Crore and for minority welfare Rs 2,400 crore.
The amount of pensions being given under Asara scheme has been increased from Rs 1000 to Rs 2016 per month.
The fiscal deficit of Telangana has been pegged at Rs 27,749 crore which is 2.81 per cent of GSDP, whose growth rate increased to Rs 10.4 per cent from 4.2 per cent.
Under double-bed room scheme, KCR said till now 272763 houses were in different stages of construction. Now new scheme of providing financial assistance to the people wanting to construct houses on their vacant lands.
Under Mission Bhagiratha, 19,750 households were provided taps. In the remaining, the works are going on and by end of April, 100 per cent works would be completed.
For irrigation department, an allocation of Rs 22,500 crore was made. He said the Central Water Commission and Finance Commission have appreciated the government for the speed of irrigation projects.