Southern States - Karnataka   

Centre urged to waive co-op. crop loan

By Our Special Correspondent

SHIMOGA NOV. 14 . The Minister for Health and Family Welfare and Information, Kagodu Thimmappa, here on Thursday urged the Union Government to waive interest on cooperative agricultural loan as done by the State Government instead of deferring the recovery of the crop loan.

He was chief guest at the inauguration of the 49th Cooperative Week and the launching of "Yashasvini", a new health care scheme for farmers. Mr. Thimmappa, who is also the District in-charge Minister, said the State Government had decided to waive interest and penal interest of Rs. 127 crore on the crop loan advanced by the cooperative banks and societies in the light of the drought conditions in 158 taluks.

He said that crop insurance was gaining popularity following the decision to take up crop cutting experiment at the gram panchayat-level to assess the extent of the crop loss on account of natural calamity.

He said the need for strengthening the cooperative institutions had found a meaning in the light of the changes being brought about by liberalisation, globalisation, and privatisation.

Mr. Thimmappa said that as the cooperative sector was nearer to the socialistic pattern of society based on the principles of socialism as enshrined in the Preamble of the Constitution, it needed to be strengthened at all levels. The century-old cooperative movement was on the threshold of a new phase poised to bring about socio economic progress of the poor and under privileged sections.

Expressing concern over the concentration of wealth among a few people, he said only through the cooperative sector decentralisation of wealth could be achieved. With the enactment of legislation, all the khatas of the cultivable land were being issued in the names of the spouses so that both husband and wife could enjoy the right to become the shareholders of the cooperative societies separately. He appealed to the DCC Bank and other cooperative institutions to bring all the farmers and farm labourers in their fold in the next six months to help them enjoy the benefits of the cooperative movement.

Hailing "Yashasvini" as an innovative health care scheme to the farmer cooperators, Mr. Thimmappa said the farmers could seek treatment under the scheme in the identified private hospitals in the taluk and district headquarters, if the facilities for the treatment of a particular disease were not available at the government hospitals, and get the expenditure reimbursed.

The President of the Shimoga Cooperative Union, R. Ganapathi Bhat, presided over the function.

The Deputy Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Nagarajaiah, welcomed the gathering.

The MLC, Shantaveerappa Gowda, the MLAs, H.M. Chandrasekharappa and G.D. Narayanappa, the President of the zilla panchayat, Rohini Nagaraj, the President of the Shimoga DCC Bank, R.M. Manjunath Gowda, the President of the city municipal council, M.K. Sureshkumar, the Deputy Commissioner, Tushar Girinath, and the Managing Director of the DCC Bank, Mahalingappa, were present.

The minister inaugurated an exhibition arranged on the occasion.

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