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Low-interest crop loans impractical, says MLA

Staff Correspondent

The scheme has been a disaster: Nagamarapalli

Bidar: Congress MLA Gurupadappa Nagamarapalli has said the State Government's dream scheme of providing crop loans at four per cent interest from cooperative institutions was faulty, unscientific and impractical.

"The State Government gained publicity by declaring in its budget that the low-interest loan scheme would solve all problems of the farmers. However, it looks fine only on paper. Its implementation has been a disaster," Mr Nagamarapalli said in a release. He is also the president of the District Central Co-operative Bank (DCCB), which is the prime lender of crop loans in the district.

"These loans are to be repaid in one year. If not, the interest on them shoots up to 12 per cent. The State Government has also put a ceiling on low-interest crop loans at Rs. 3 lakh," he said.

Disbursed

He said the DCCB, which provides 60 per cent of crop loans in the district, had given loans of Rs. 14.94 crore to 8,543 farmers at four per cent interest.

The bank has also released Rs. 40 crore as loans to 8,500 self-help groups of the 10,521 SHGs in the district.

Award from NABARD

Hence the bank had won an award from the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) for linking the maximum number of SHGs to banks. NABARD would soon announce Bidar as "SHG District", which means it has maximum SHGs per village, he said. The bank is also running pre-nursery bridge learning centres in 20 villages in Aurad taluk, in association with the Bangalore-based Akshara Foundation.

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