While presenting Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(S)) coalition government’s maiden budget for 2018-19, Karnataka Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy on Thursday announced a partial farm loan waiver of Rs. 34,000 crore, benefitting those farmers whose borrowings are less than Rs. 2 lakhs.
He further said that the Karnataka government would waive all defaulted crop loans of farmers up to December 31, 2017.
“To facilitate the farmers to avail new loans action will be taken by the govt to issue clearance certificate by waiving the arrears form the defaulting account. For this purpose, Rs 6500 crore is earmarked in the 2018-19 budget,” Kumaraswamy said.
A really good part of the budget is the government’s intention to reward those he didn’t default.
“Farmers who repaid the loan within time, as an encouragement to the non-defaulting farmers, I have decided to credit the repaid loan amount or Rs. 25000 whichever is less,” he said.
Another major announcement was the increase of rate of tax on petrol and diesel.
“I propose to increase the rate of tax on petrol from the present 30% to 32% and diesel from 19% to 21%, so petrol price will be increased by Rs.1.14/ltr and diesel by Rs 1.12/ltr,” he said.
He further said that considering the popularity of Indira Canteens in Bengaluru, action has been taken to open 247 Indira Canteens in all taluks and district headquarters of the state at an expenditure of Rs. 211 crores.
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Throwing light on the Anna Bhagya scheme, the Karnataka Chief Minister said, “5kg rice free of cost, 1/2 kg toor dal with subsidized rate and 1 kg palm oil, 1kg iodine and iron content salt and 1kg sugar to each BPL card holder under Anna Bhagya scheme”.
Some other budget highlights include:
- Tax on consumption of electricity proposed to be increased from 6% to 9%.
- 3 frozen semen distribution centres will be established at divisional level in Dharwad, Kalaburgi and Mysuru at Rs 2.25 crore.
- In an attempt to enhance skills and entrepreneurship quality, state govt to introduce new scheme- Kayaka, under this scheme 0 % interest loans up to 5 lakh and 4% between Rs 5 to 10 lakh.
- In an attempt to address the issues of street vendors/small vendors, state government to come up with Badavara Bandhu mobile service in five cities of Karnataka.
- For the development and repair infrastructure of govt graduate and postgraduate colleges, a grant of Rs 250 crore will be provided as a special package.
- New medical college will be established at Kanakapura in Ramanagara district.
- Mandya Medical Science Institute Hospital will be upgraded to 800-bed hospital. Rs 30 crore will be earmarked for this.
- A grant of Rs 12 crore will be provided in the first phase to establish a separate unit at Kidwai cancer hospital for treatment of bone marrow transplant.
- Rs 40 crore will be provided to establish a 300-bed super speciality hospital at Ramanagara.
- New super speciality hospitals will be opened at Belagavi, Kalaburgi and Mysuru cities to provide tertiary health services relating to heart, cancer and other diseases. 450-bed capacity new hospitals will be established in the medical colleges of Gadag, Koppal, Chamarajanagar and Hassan districts and Rs 200 crore is provided.
- Rs 3 crore share capital will be provided to the private companies who will come forward to open 3-star hotels having 500 room facilities. 30 per cent capital will be provided on term sheet basis to the organisations if they come forward to construct service apartments.
- Assistance will be provided to SC/ST graduates for training to competitive exams of the UPSC, KPSC, banking in collaboration with private training institute in Kalaburgi city.
- Three model roadway facility to come up on the major national highways during this year to provide facility to the tourist to relax, breakfast and meals.