One class of citizens can remain happy - Farmers

Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on Wednesday asked three state-run banks in West Bengal to expedite the process of cancelling farm loans.

His directions came during a video conference with the officials of the United Bank of India, Allahabad Bank and UCO Bank. He asked them to finalise the list of farmers eligible for loan waiver by June 20.

More than 40 million farmers across the country are expected to benefit from the scheme for which the central government has set aside over Rs.700 billion.

According to a UCO Bank official who attended the video conference, Chidambaram asked the banks to complete the whole process soon so that new loans could be given to those farmers from July 1.