The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : “Revise farmers’ loan waiver scheme”

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Wednesday, Mar 19, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

“Revise farmers’ loan waiver scheme”

Staff Reporter

MADURAI: The Communist Party of India on Tuesday asked the Centre to revise its Rs.60,000-crore farmers’ loan waiver programme in order to benefit all farmers.

“Only a negligible number of farmers will benefit as most of them get loans from private money lenders,” CPI State secretary D. Pandian said.

He told reporters that instead of waiving the loans obtained through public sector banks, the money should be given as soft loan at 4 per cent rate interest through cooperative banks. The farmers should be given a month’s time to register with the cooperative banks to avail of the loan.

He said India was entering a period of recession on the lines of the U.S. economy, but the Union Budget has failed to provide any solution to the crisis. Rising prices of essential commodities due to “speculative economy,” and a falling stock market showed that the Indian economy was “entangled in a crisis.”

Though Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram had been promising 9.5 per cent growth rate, for the period between January and March 2008 it was only 5.28 per cent. “The budget has neither encouraged the rich nor provided succour to the poor,” he added.

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