# Not a single farmer's entire crop loan will be waived off if it is above Rs 2 lakh.# Not a single farmer's loan of even less than Rs 2 lakh will be waived off if he owns land more than 5 acres.# Not a single farmer's loan of even Rs 1 will be waived off if he has taken loan from aarhtiya, commission agent or money lender# Not even a Rs 1 lakh loan of a small farmer, even if he owns merely 1 acre of land, will be waived off if he has taken this loan for completing the last rites of his dead mother, or the marriage of his daughter or son, or for buying a cow or a buffalo.# Loans taken for any other purpose except crop loan will not be waived off, no matter if it is a small farmer, marginal farmer or semi-medium, medium or large landholding owner farmer.# If a farmer has borrowed from neighbours, relatives, friends and has committed suicide, the government will not take over any loan, even if the amount is a mere Rs 50,000.# Farm labourers who are invariably in debt have been completely left out from the ambit of Amarinder Singh's loan waiver announcement.# In the case of a family where a farmer has committed suicide, the government will not take over any loan if it was for buying a cow or a buffalo.# The government will not take over any loan of a family of a farmer who has committed suicide if the loan was taken from an aarhtiya or commission agent.# Amarinder Singh government will not take over the loan of a suicide-affected family if it was taken for the marriage of a son or daughter or for any other socio-religious purposes.
* Crop loans of up to Rs 2 lakh of Punjab's small and marginal farmers will be waived off, only if availed from institutional sources (read banks).* Marginal farmers (owning up to 2.5 acres of land) will find their loan liability reduced by Rs 2 lakh if taken from institutional sources, but only if it was a crop loan.* The ex-gratia relief for suicide affected families has been raised to Rs 5 lakh from the existing Rs 3 lakh. It is not clear whether it will come into effect retrospectively. Will the government give an additional Rs 2 lakh to those it gave Rs 3 lakh?* The government has proposed that the Speaker of Punjab Assembly may constitute a 5-member committee of MLAs to visit the families of the suicide victims, ascertain the reasons for suicides and suggest further steps to ameliorate their condition. It is not clear whether this panel will include an MLA from the opposition, or if it will merely be an all-Congress affair.
* The CM said "mutually acceptable debt reconciliation and settlement" will be achieved in case of loans raised from non-institutional resources such as aarhtiyas, money lenders, commission agents or shopkeepers etc. But this, too, will be only for farmers, not agriculture labourers, the press release of the CMO made it clear.* Amarinder Singh said the loan waiver decision was based on the interim report of the Expert Group, headed by eminent economist Dr T. Haque. What he did not say was whether the details, including leaving out the farm labourers and farmers owning more than 5 acres of land and the entire debt owed to aarhtiyas were all part of the recommendations of the T.Haque panel.
-------------
Punjab Today believes in serious, engaging, narrative journalism at a time when mainstream media houses seem to have given up on long-form writing and news television has blurred or altogether erased the lines between news and slapstick entertainment. We at Punjab Today believe that readers such as yourself appreciate cerebral journalism, and would like you to hold us against the best international industry standards. Brickbats are welcome even more than bouquets, though an occasional pat on the back is always encouraging. Good journalism can be a lifeline in these uncertain times worldwide. You can support us in myriad ways. To begin with, by spreading word about us and forwarding this reportage. Stay engaged.
— Team PT