Over Rs 237 crore farm loans waived in dist

NAGPUR: The state government has waived off farm loans to the tune of Rs 237.30 crore in the district and the process is still not over. Guardian minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule hopes to waive off loans of all applicants by March 31.
Addressing a press conference on Monday, the minister said that 1,11,006 farmers had applied for loan waiver of which applications of 53,139 persons had been cleared by state government. "The applications of remaining persons have not been rejected and are under technical scrutiny. There were either some problems with the applications or the bank had not properly calculated the interest amount," he added.

The minister said that of the 53,139 applicants, 28,882 had taken loan from Nagpur District Central Cooperative Bank (NDCCB) while 24,257 were clients of nationalized banks.

"So far 21,164 farmers having accounts in NDCCB have been given Rs 144 crore while 18,276 farmers having accounts in nationalized banks were given Rs 92 crore. The remaining cases include about 5,000 farmers who have to go for one-time settlement (OTS) of the loan over and above Rs 1.5 lakh and those requiring minor rectification in their applications," he further said.

Replying to a query, Bawankule said that as of now two applications have been received from farmers after the due date. "We are now allowing farmers to apply manually for loan waiver. They need not apply online anymore," he added.

Replying to another query, the minister said, "Some 17,000 persons from Nagpur city applied for the loan waiver of which about 3,000 had taken loans from NDCCB."

The finance ministry had reduced the District Planning Committee (DPC) fund by 30% from Rs 596 crore to Rs 437 crore to make funds available for loan waiver.

Commenting on this, Bawankule said, "The reduction in DPC fund is to the tune of Rs 159 crore whereas farmers have received Rs 237 crore so far. The district has, therefore, got more funds."

The minister claimed that the loss of DPC fund would be less than Rs 159 crore.

"We have already allocated Rs 478 crore to various departments. I will urge finance minister Sudhir Mungantiwar not to seek return of the extra money already allocated," he said.