The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Credit policy not helpful: farmers

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Oct 14, 2004

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Credit policy not helpful: farmers

By Our Special Correspondent

CHENNAI, OCT. 13. The credit policy of the Central and State Governments is not helpful to cultivating farmers, the Tamil Nadu Vivasaigal Sangam charged here today.

The general secretary, V. Duraimanickam, in a statement, said that though both the Governments announced that the farmers would not have any difficulty in getting the crop loan it was not so in reality.

The farmers had to shuttle between the cooperative and nationalised banks to get the loan.

He alleged that the State had issued specific instruction to cooperative banks not to issue loans to farmers who had dues but only to those who had cleared their earlier loans. Even if loan was sanctioned to a farmer who had arrears it was adjusted against his earlier loan and only the balance amount was paid to him. There were cases where the cooperative banks were issuing only no-objection certificates to eligible farmers and not loans.

The nationalised banks were also shirking their responsibility by asking the farmers to approach the cooperative banks for their credit requirement.

The State Government's allotment of Rs. 1,037 crores would not be sufficient to meet the credit requirement of the farmers.

Demanding waiving of entire farm loan dues, he said the total outstanding would be of the order of only Rs. 2,100 crores compared to the non-performing assets of the banks which was about Rs. 2 lakh crores.

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