In yet another big decision in favour of farmers, the state government has decided to help farmers with one-time settlement of their non- performing bank accounts.
Government will clear 50% of the loan farmers owe to banks.
21 public sector banks and IDBI bank have been included in this list.
A decision in this regard was taken at a meeting of the state cabinet held here at Mahanadi Bhawan on Wednesday. The cabinet meeting was held after a long gap due to enforcement of model code of conduct in state because of general elections.
Minister for water resources and agriculture Ravindra Choubey and minister for forest, housing, environment and civil supplies, Mohammad Akbar briefed the media about the decision taken in the cabinet meeting.
They informed media persons that there would be an additional burden of Rs 650 crore on the state exchequer due to the settlement of bank loans. It would be a major relief for farmers who failed to avail further loans due to their names in defaulters list, they said.
Earlier the state government had waived off short term farm loans the farmers had taken from cooperative and public sector banks.
Now the settlement of farmer’s loans would also be done for nationalized banks which were till now hesitating to settle the amount due to non performing bank accounts.