BHUBANESHWAR: Acute shortage of cash affecting kharif post-harvest activities and rabi operations, the state government urged the Centre to provide adequate currency to cooperative credit structures to meet the cash demands of farmers.
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik shot off a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi today seeking his intervention in the matter at the earliest.
The DCCBs are facing severe liquidity crunch following restriction on the credit structures to accept demonetised bank notes as deposits. Besides, the currency chest branches of the commercial banks are not able to provide currency to the DCCBs to cope with the demands of the farmers at the PACS (primary agriculture cooperative society) level for their rabi operation, the letter said.
As the PACS are treated at par with individuals and allowed to draw only Rs 24,000 per week from their accounts in DCCBs, the primary lending societies are unable to cater to the demand for crop loans, procurement proceeds and insurance claims pertaining kharif-2015.
"We are finding it difficult to transfer the procurement price of paddy from the Odisha State Cooperative Bank to the farmers accounts held in different nationalised banks, cooperative banks and Regional Rural Banks, if it is a Jan Dhan account. Such transfers were rejected in many cases causing enormous hardship to the farmers," the Chief Minister
said.
He sought the intervention of the Prime Minister for adequate flow of cash to DCCBs from the currency chest branches of commercial banks under the direct monitoring of the regional office of the Reserve Bank of India.
Further, the limit imposed on withdrawals by PACS should be lifted so that these primary societies can cater to the credit requirements of the farmers, he added.
The procurement dues of farmers should be allowed to be credited to the
beneficiaries accounts without insisting on the time consuming of KYC (know your costumer) verification, the letter said.
Collectors of several districts yesterday reported the Chief Minister about the cash crunch in rural areas affecting agricultural operations in the rabi season and payment to farmers during paddy procurement.