The State government’s policy decision over the farm loan waiver appears to have failed to deter bankers from serving legal notices on farmers, insisting the latter on clearance of pending dues. A group of farmers from Ponangi village staged a demonstration at the N.R. Pet branch of the Indian Bank here on Friday, protesting against the alleged coercive measures being taken by the bank officials for recovery of dues.
Incidentally, 15 tenant farmers from the village received legal notices from the Indian Bank, N.R. Pet Branch, for their failure to clear the dues in time just a day after the government’s announcement over loan waiver. The branch lent to 30 tenant farmers under the Loan Eligibility Card (LEC) scheme nearly three years ago and the borrowers failed to repay the loans in view of the series of vagaries of nature that failed the crops. As a result, the loans are set to join the category of ‘over dues’ by August 25, forcing the bank authorities to serve legal notices on the borrowers.
Each tenant farmer had received a loan of Rs 5,000 under the LEC scheme. The bank officials said that they were forced to proceed against the defaulters for want of guidelines regarding waiver of loans. The tenant farmers have been asked to clear their dues within a week after they receive the notices.
K. Srinivas, secretary of the district committee of the AP Kaulu Rytula Sangham, reminded Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu of his promise that the loan waiver scheme would give a thrust to extend relief to the tenant farmers and urged him to come to their rescue.
