HC dismisses petition on crop loan waiver scheme

Chennai, Jul 1 (UNI) Madras High Court today dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL), seeking to extend the Centre's crop loan waiver scheme to all farmers in the country.

The first bench, comprising Chief Justice A K Ganguly and Justice F M Ibrahim Kalifulla, dismissed the petition, filed by senior advocate R Kaaruppan, at the admission stage saying that the petition was not maintainable under the Constitution.

In his petition, the senior advocate sought a direction to Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram to extent the crop loan waiver scheme to all the farmers across India, irrespective of the area of the land held by them with the cut of date being June 12, 2008.

''The denial of farm loan waiver to the farmers, owning more than five acres of land, is arbitrary, illegal, malafide and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution,'' the adovate said in his petition.

UNI XR SJ SW GC1931