File photo: Drought-affected farmer in Andhra Pradesh
The Comptroller and Auditor General's (CAG) final report on the farm loan waiver scheme has been tabled in Parliament.
Announced by the UPA-I government in 2008, the scheme had written off debt of almost 4 crore farmers totalling to about Rs 52,000 crore.
Highlights of the CAG report:
- Overall, the Performance Audit revealed that out of 90,576 cases audited, the CAG found lapses and errors in 20,216 which raised serious concerns about the implementation of the scheme.
- Of the 9, 334 accounts examined across 9 states 1257 accounts (13.46 per cent) not eligible for benefits
- Of the 80,299 accounts granted debt waiver or debt relief about 8.5 per cent were not eligible -about 20.5 crores were given to ineligible persons
- There was tampering found in 2824 cases with a total claim amount of Rs 8.64 crore
- 42 lending institutions didn't prepare a proper list of beneficiaries