Kolhapur banks delay paying govt cheques

Bank consumers receiving cheques from the state government's local offices and postal department of the Union government are compelled to wait for more than 15 days for getting their cheques cleared.

This is because these cheques are not bearing the 'magnetic ink character reader'(MICR facility and relevant numbers and are therefore denied for immediate clearance by the Punjab National Bank (PNB) which is clearing agency for the Kolhapur region.

Cheques of the most nationalised banks have MICR facility and such cheques are accepted by the PNB for immediate clearance. But cheques of most of the co-operative banks and those issued by the state government's local treasury office and postal department have a MICR facility without which they are not accepted for immediate clearance.

According to S S Potdar, officer of the concerned wing of the treasury office there are 10,000 state and central government pensioners who are put to inconvenience due to the delay in getting the pension payment as the cheques or pay orders printed in the government press do not have any MICR facility or the required numbers and their payment is delayed by the PNB which is expected to make some provisions for immediate payment until the MICR cheques are printed by the government press.

Prasad Burande, chief of the district consumers" organisation says that the delay in getting payment of the non-MICR cheques amounts to consumers" undue harassment.

If both the state government and postal department of the Union government have no facility to supply MICR cheques the finance ministry and the Reserve Bank of India should instruct the clearing bank agency to accept the non-MICR cheques for immediate payment until arrangement to supply MICR cheques is made by the government.

The chairman of the six-member clearing agency committee R C Mogale has confirmed the inconvenience caused due to the delay in clearing the non-MICR cheques.

However, in view of growing complaints regarding the delay some alternative arrangement is being made to clear non-micr cheques so as to avoid any delay, he said.