Govt fixes 6-month moratorium on ryots repaying pvt lenders

Bill may lack teeth in reality

It may be best termed as a political measure which may have no consequence after all.

The Andhra Pradesh state government on Monday passed a bill imposing a six-month moratorium on repayment of loans from private lenders taken by farmers for agriculture purposes.

The Y S Rajasekhara Reddy government went ahead and got the bill approved by its sheer strength in the House on the very day of its introduction even as the opposition TDP demanded that the government include loans taken from commercial banks and co-operative banks also in the bill.

But the government stoutly refused to make any amendments, including those proposed by the opposition. The state government did not even agree to extend the period of moratorium for two years, saying that the necessity of extending the moratorium would be reviewed whenever it required.

The key clause of the bill says that no civil court shall entertain any suit or other proceeding against the debtor for the recovery of any amount of the debt borrowed or incurred including interest during the moratorium period.

Except this, practically there was no other measure proposed by the government to make the law effective.

The Congress government has taken the measure in view of the alleged harassment of farmers by private lenders leading to most cases of farmers'suicides.

The bill covers loans taken for agriculture purposes which include horticulture plantation crops, dairy farming, poultry farming, breeding of livestock and bees and grazing.

Speaking to Business Standard, senior TDP member and former finance minister Y Ramakrishnalu said that no farmer will get relief under the proposed act as most of them do not write the specific purpose for which they take loans and this gave ample scope to private lenders to escape the provisions of the new bill.

Undeterred by the snubbing from the treasury benches, TDP members demanded a division on the issue of approving the amendments proposed to the bill, which were finally rejected, with around 178 votes not favouring the amendments. Revenue minister Dharmana Prasada Rao introduced the bill.