The farm loan waiver scheme announced by Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy is expected to give big relief to farmers.

Loans up to ₹2 lakh taken from commercial and nationalised banks would be waived off. Nearly 80,000 farmers are expected to benefit from this in Dharwad district.

Deputy Commissioner M. Deepa has said in a release that during the first phase, the government has announced waiver of loans availed from co-operative societies and during the second phase, it has announced waiver of loans of farmers from commercial and nationalised banks.

The district administration has already collected data of farmers who have taken loans and are unable to repay owing to various reasons. This data has been retrieved from the Central Data Base from respective banks.

Those who have borrowed loans and invested in their fields between the period April 1, 2009 and December 31, 2017 can benefit from this, she said.

The government has also issued an order of waiving up to ₹2 lakh NPA, restructured and overdue loans. Also, ₹25,000 incentive would be given to farmers who have renewed their crop loans on time. Eligible farmers are requested to make use of this scheme, which will be in force from December 15 to 31. Farmers have to approach their respective banks and submit self-declaration along with ration card, Aadhaar card and survey number. Submitting ration card has been made compulsory, she added.

As a large number of farmers are expected at the banks during this period, the district administration has introduced a token system to contain the rush. Accordingly, every day, each bank will issue and accept self-declaration forms of 40 applicants. The administration would appoint its staff in every branch to issue tokens to farmers coming to the bank seeking loan waiver. Date and time would be mentioned on the token and the farmers have to come to the bank on respective date, she said.