Gujarat government headed by Chief Minister Vijay Rupani has announced on Tuesday that Rs 650 crore in electricity bills in rural areas will be waived off. “Total 6.22 lakh connection holders in rural areas across the state will be benefited with this waiver to the tune of Rs 650 crore pending electricity bills,” Gujarat’s energy minister Saurabh Patel said.
Gujarat’s energy minister Saurabh Patel has announced that a total of 6.22 lakh connection holders in rural areas in Prime Minister Modi’s home state will benefit with this waiver amounting to Rs 650 crore in pending electricity bills.
The minister confirmed that the connections are domestic, agricultural as well as commercial and were discontinued due to power theft and non-payment of bills
This comes a day after the ruling Congress party in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh announced a loan waiver for farmers as per the poll promise just a few hours after the Chief Ministers took their charge. Many political commentators have blamed the agrarian distress as the cause for the Bharatiya Janata Party BJP’s worse performance in decades.
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Within hours after taking office, the newly elected Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh – Kamal Nath – waived off the short-term farm loans of up to Rs 2 lakh as on March 31, 2018. However, the condition is that they have to be from nationalised and the cooperative banks, which will be benefiting about 3.4 million farmers, reports say.
Similarly, Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Bhagel, who too assumed office charge on Monday, announced that his government will be waiving off farm loans worth Rs 6,100 crore. The move will be benefiting about 1.66 million farmers in the state.
Following this, Congress chief Rahul Gandhi Tuesday attacked the BJP-led government over the unfortunate situation of farmers and said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi only worries about the wealthy businessmen.
“Will not allow Modi to sleep till he waives the loan,” the Congress chief was quoted as saying on Parliament House premises on Tuesday.
The new developments have given an interesting twist to the political fight between the ruling BJP and the opposition ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in 2019.
