The state government has decided to restructure loans of farmers in the drought-affected Marathwada and Vidarbha regions for the next five years.
The state government has decided to restructure loans of farmers in the drought-affected Marathwada and Vidarbha regions for the next five years. The loans of Rs 5,000 crore will be restructured and the farmers from over 26,000 villages will benefit from it. They can avail for fresh loans in 2016.
“The Cabinet has decided to restructure loans of the farmers in drought-affected villages in Vidarbha and Marathwada. The loans’ repayment period will be of five years and the state will have to pay the interest for the first year. This will help the farmers to get loans for 2016. The restructuring will be done for loans worth Rs 5,000 crore,” cooperative minister Chandrakant Patil said after the Cabinet meeting. This re-structuring will also include the loan of the year 2014-15 which amounts to Rs 300 crore.
The beneficiaries of this move will be 15,747 villages from across the state and 11,862 villages from Vidarbha that were added later. The villages have anewari (a revenue standard to measure crops) of less than 50 paise. A village is declared drought affected if its anewari is less than 50 paise.
The loan restructuring is for nationalised and district banks. The banks had given loans of Rs 29,680 crore to Rs 47 lakh farmers in the state in year 2015. However, the farmers could not repay it and are hence not eligible to get new loans. In the restructuring process, the government will pay the interest for the first year and the farmers will just have to pay the interest for the next four years, said the minister. The rate of interest charged would also be a nominal 6 per cent, Mr Patil added.
The minister also said that the farmers are going to get around Rs 4,000 crore from crop insurance for losing their kharif crop. “The government has provided the compensation for the lost kharif crop. The farmers will also get Rs 4,000 crore as insurance. About 37 lakh farmers are going to benefit from it and the cheques will be given out on May 15,” Mr Patil said.
The state has also requested the Reserve Bank of India to allow the restructuring of loans worth Rs 2,438 crore that have been pending of 2013-13 and 2013-14. For the year 2014-15 also, the state has decided to repay Rs 300 crore from the pending loan amount, said the minister.
