Adityanath Waives Loans Up to Rs 1 Lakh in First Cabinet Meeting

Delivering on the BJP's election manifesto, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath waived loans of up to Rs 1 lakh for small and medium farmers. The decision was taken during the first cabinet meeting that was held in Lucknow on Tuesday. Waiving the loans will add a burden of Rs 30,729 crore to the state.

The BJP, in its Lok Kalyan Sankalp Patra (manifesto), had promised to waive the loans of small and marginal farmers.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi too had said in his campaign speeches that writing off farm loans would be among the foremost tasks of the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh.

Government sources said around 2.3 crore farmers in the state suffered losses due to natural calamities in the recent past and were unable to repay loans amounting to about Rs 62,000 crore.

BJP said that it could be difficult to handle the burden of the loan waiver in a single financial year and that was one of the reasons to put the cabinet meeting on hold till a way was found to honour the prime minister's poll promise that the BJP government would take a decision on farm loan waiver at its first cabinet meeting.

Besides the farm loan waiver, the cabinet also took up other issues like legalising slaughterhouses, licenses of meat-sellers, extending more



help to the water-scarce Bundelkhand region and sorting out the problems related to Purvanchal - issues mentioned in BJP's manifesto.

The spokesman said Finance Minister Rajesh Agarwal had been busy holding deliberations with senior officials of his department to honour the pre-poll promise at the earliest.

The government will have to pay the banks for the farm loan waiver. For that, it will either have to seek funds from the Centre or raise loans on its own, he added.

Mahesh Sharma Meets Adityanath Over Ramayana Museum in Ayodhya

Giving a push to the much talked about Ramayana Museum in Ayodhya, Union Tourism Minister Mahesh Sharma met Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and held detailed deliberations on starting the project, part of the Ramayana circuit of his ministry.

"We had a detailed discussion on the works related to Ramayana museum which had run into some problems during the previous government even though the Union government was all set to release Rs 154 crore for the project," Sharma said after the meeting.

"I have full faith that the central and state governments will work together to boost tourism and spiritual tourism in the state, and UP will become a hub of tourism in the country," he said.