Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who along with four of his Cabinet colleagues visited Haveri district to hold a review meeting on Tuesday, said that there is no marked increase in the number of farmers death reported from the district.
However, officials have been directed to initiate measures to prevent farmers from taking such extreme steps.
Addressing a press conference after visiting the District Hospital, interacting with farmers and public and holding the review meeting, Mr. Siddaramaiah said that he chose to visit Haveri in the wake of reports about farmers deaths but to his consolation found that it is not alarming.
“As per data, after our government came into existence, six farmers deaths have been reported and of them, compensation has already been paid to three families and other cases are being verified. We will verify any other cases and those reported during the previous regime will also be verified and compensated, if found true,” he said.
Mr. Siddaramaiah said that the State government has taken up several farmer-friendly initiatives. “In the budget, we have increased interest free loan to farmers from ₹3 lakh to ₹5 lakh. Loans to farmers at the rate of 3% interest has been increased to ₹15 lakh from ₹10 lakh. Krishi Bhagya is being reintroduced. Under Anugraha scheme, we were compensating for loss of livestock, by paying ₹5,000 for sheep and goat and ₹10,000 for the loss of buffalo, ox and cow. The previous government had stopped it and we are reintroducing it now,” he explained.
Elaborating on the implementation of the five guarantees, he said that so far, 25 crore women have availed themselves of the benefits under the scheme. “Under Gruha Jyoti scheme, electricity consumers using less than 200 units of power per month will get zero bill from August 1. Implementation of Gruha Lakshmi scheme has begun and the benefits will be credited through DBT from August,” he said and added that all the programmes mentioned in the manifesto of the Congress will be implemented.
On the Mahadayi project, he said that steps will be taken to ensure that the interests of farmers are protected no matter what the Government of Goa did to pose hurdles to the project.
Earlier, speaking to presspersons in Hubballi before proceeding to Haveri, Mr. Siddaramaiah declined to comment on Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar’s statement that a conspiracy is being hatched in Singapore to topple his government.
Replying to a query on comments from BJP leaders that there will be drought in the State because of the Congress coming to power, he said that he did not believe in superstitious comments. “During the BJP rule, one lakh houses were destroyed by floods. Floods and rain deficit are natural phenomena and climate change is also the reason behind it. Usually, monsoon begins in June, but this time it has been delayed a bit. The impact of climate change is everywhere,” he said.
On the possible alliance between the BJP and the Janata Dal(S), he said that irrespective of whether they allied with each other, the Congress will comfortably win 15 to 20 seats in the next Lok Sabha elections.
To another query, he said that criminal cases will be filed against authorised agents demanding money for registration under Gruha Lakshmi scheme.
