Bangalore (PTI): Syndicate Bank on wednesday said it was extending debt waiver scheme benefiting 2,80,027 marginal and small farmers to the extent of Rs 756.27 crore and 1,13,622 other farmers amounting to Rs 307.01 crore.

"Totally, 3,93,649 farmers will get a total benefit of Rs 1063.28 crore from Syndicate Bank branches," it said in a statement.

Altogether 1,352 branches, mostly in rural and semi-urban centres throughout the country, have actively participated in implementing the scheme, it said.

Executive Director George Joseph personally visited some branches during the process of preparation of the list of eligible farmers. He also visited Somanahalli, Maddur, Mandya and Shivalli branches of Mandya district in Karnataka on June 30 and distributed debt waiver certificates to the eligible farmers, kick-starting the process of the final stage of implementation of the scheme.

The bank said it is confident of completing the total process of handing over debt waiver and debt relief certificates to the eligible farmers latest by July 15.

It has issued instructions to all the branches for extending fresh finance to the beneficiaries of scheme, to enable them to undertake Kharif operations, in view of the fact that the monsoon has already set in several states and the farming operations have commenced.