And yet distress continues unabated. Yet suicides go on increasing. Who is swallowing up these packages? What is happening to the packages?

The Report of the Radhakrishna Committee – The Expert Group on Agricultural Indebtedness – gives a part of the answer. It sets out the result of its inquiries into the fate of the PM’s special package in its Report:

•Commenting on the disbursement of fresh loans, the Committee observes, ‘The gap in the off take of fresh credit in three states (Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra) indicates that the credit needs of the farmers were not assessed accurately. The credit flow targets do not appear to have been based on a proper assessment of the credit absorption capacity at the farm/household level. In order to ensure that the basic objectives of providing farm credit are not distorted, disbursements should have been made only after proper project appraisal. This also calls for greater coordination among banks and block level officials at the ground level in identifying the genuine credit needs of the people.’

•In regard to ‘Irrigation’, it finds, ‘Utilization rates varied across states and between irrigation schemes. In the case of major irrigation schemes, delay occurred because for some of them like Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme (AIBP) sanction has to be obtained from the Planning Commission and for many others from the Ministry of Environment and Forest and Tribal Affairs. This is a time-consuming process.’

Pause a moment. That sentence itself gives us a glimpse of the well-practiced trick: the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme is an existing programme. All that has been done is that it has now been shoved into the new envelope, ‘The PM’s special package for distressed farmers in 31 districts’! But to continue with the findings of the Radhakrishna Committee:

... contd.