TIRUNELVELI
The Women’s India Movement has appealed to the Collector to save the self-help group women from micro-finance firms and moneylenders, who are allegedly threatening them to repay their loans with interest even as the borrowers have been left unemployed and without any income due to COVID-19.
According to Syed Ali Fatima, Tirunelveli city district secretary of Women’s India Movement, who led the petitioners to the Collectorate to drop the petition on Saturday seeking action against the micro-finance firms coercing the borrowers, most of the women affiliated to the self-help groups in Tirunelveli city, particularly from Melapalayam area, had borrowed money from the micro-finance firms since they were from very poor background.
As most of them, all beedi rollers, labourers and farmhands, were facing medical expenses due to the outbreak of COVID-19 that started ravaging the country since March 2020, they, after spending their trivial savings, had borrowed money from the micro-finance firms and the local moneylenders to manage their medical bills.
While the pandemic crippled their life, the lockdown led to the temporary closure of their workplaces and ultimately made them unemployed. The situation worsened further after the second wave of COVID-19 struck the already decimated population, leaving them at the mercy of the moneylenders and the micro-finance firms again.
“Even after the Collector had warned the moneylenders and the micro-finance firms against threatening the borrowers, the coercion continues, much to the agony of the poor. Hence, the district administration should take action to bail out the borrowers from this tough situation,” Ms. Syed Ali Fatima appealed.
