Hyderabad: The Andhra Pradesh government and bankers are at loggerheads over the delay in finalisation of eligible farmers list for waiver of the farm loan scheme.
The AP government’s deadline was September 15 to provide the final list of eligible farmers, but finance officials said so far 60 per cent has been completed.
Government officials said they have provided all the facilities, including net connection to the banks in rural areas. But, bank officers are working only two or three hours a day after completion of their regular bank work.
Bankers, on the other hand, say that the government is changing the format frequently, and they have to start the work from the beginning whenever the format changes. They said the reason for the delay in finalising the list is due to the changing of format.
To identify eligible farmers under the waiver of farm loans scheme, the AP government issued orders stating the guideline last month. The government said that the waiver will be applicable to the loans taken by the farmers up to December 31, 2013 and the interest amount up to March 31, 2014.
But, within a week the government issued another order changing the guidelines.
The government said that the loans and the interest will be taken up to December 31, 2013. The state government’s IT department prepared the format to finalise the list of farmers and gave it to the bankers.
When some bankers said that their branches in rural areas had no net connection the government provided the facility to all the bank branches in rural areas. The government asked the bankers to submit the final list by September 15. But the bankers did not complete even 50 per cent of work by that time.
This was brought to the notice of the Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu by a person, who is playing a key role in the waiver of farm loans scheme.
He told Mr Naidu that the bankers are not concentrating on completion of the list at the earliest and are giving importance to their regular work.
