ELECTIONS '98
COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ARCHIVES

Munde endorses Thackeray's scheme of free power supply to farmers

Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Gopinath Munde has endorsed Shiv Sena Chief Bal Thackeray's announcement of free power supply to farmers and said this will entail a burden of Rs 6.5 billion on the state exchequer.

Munde, who also holds the energy portfolio, said he has discussed the proposed scheme with Chief Minister Manohar Joshi and offered three options for meeting the financial requirement in this regard.

He said the first option was to make budgetary allocations of Rs 6.5 billion, secondly to cut expenditure of other departments and reallocate their funds. The third option was to increase the cess so that 2.2 million farmers in the state would be benefited.

However, he said he was not in favour of allowing a fresh hike in power tariff as it had been increased recently.

UNI

Tell us what you think of this report