Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank (MSCB) has come up with a novel solution for farmers who are suffering due to weak DCCBs, not able to give them crop loans. The co-op bank’s new scheme aims at providing direct loans to farmers connected with Primary Agricultural Societies, thereby bypassing weak DCCBs.
The out of box solution was conceived by Vidyadhar Anaskar, Chairman of the Administrative board MSC Bank and his team. Sharing the details Anaskar said “Several rounds of talks with the concerned authorities have already taken place and a final shape of the scheme would emerge sooner than later.
Eager to involve Union Road and Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari in this regard, Anaskar said “I have also talked to him and he has assured me to organize a meeting with the Nabard Chairman after 18th August”, revealed Anaskar.
He further added that, “Some District Central Co-operative Banks in the State are financially weak and as such they are not able to provide crop loans to farmers through Primary Agricultural Societies in their area of operation. These DCCBs are not eligible to seek re-finance from NABARD.
“In view of the difficulties faced by eligible farmers, the MSC Bank has drawn up a unique scheme to provide direct loans to farmers through eligible Primary Agricultural Societies and the policy for the same is submitted to NABARD for approval”, Anaskar informed.
He added that the loans will be monitored by concerned DCC Banks. These banks will also assist the MSC Bank for managing these accounts and recovery of the crop loans. One percent of the recovery amount will be paid to these DCC Banks as service charges. This is the first scheme of its kind in the Country”, he said.
Out of 31DCCBs in the state five DCCBs’ financial position is not good and their NPA exceeds 70 percent”. It is reported that NPAs of six DCCBs including Beed, Nagpur, Osmanabad, Buldana, Wardha are worrying.
In particular, the Beed and Buldhana DCCBs are weighed down by NPAs hovering around 86 %. Given RBI’s monetary restrictions on higher NPAs, some of the DCCBs in the state will find it difficult to give crop loans to the farmers.
There are 21k PACCs in the state and on average 900 farmers are linked with each PACCs.