The first nation-wide farm loan waiver was implemented in 1990 by Janata Party government led by then Prime Minister V.P.
[7] The top executives of these banks and institutions were also urged by the Indian Government to visit their rural and semi-urban branches to enable better and faster implementation of the scheme.
Critics said that the loan waiver was simply a populist move by the UPA Government in view of the forthcoming elections.
[9] According to Parshuram Ray, director of the New Delhi-based Center for Environment and Food Security, the loan waiver was "an electoral sop that involves a lot of statistical jugglery and very little of real hope for Indian farmers.
"[10] An important feature of the program which has been heavily criticized is that it covers only formal sources of credit and excludes any kind of informal loan.
[12] In 2017, at least four states Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab and Karnataka, announced farmer loan waivers, with estimated cost of about US$13.6 billion.