CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has ordered a detailed report from the state government on a plea seeking to expedite the process in availing farm loans through the Primary Agricultural Co-operative Society (PACS).
The central government through NABARD introduced a method for disbursement of loans to farmers without the interference of middlemen. The farmers will be getting the entire loan amount directly from their accounts termed as a ‘mirror account’. However, farmers moved the court seeking time to open bank accounts.
According to the petitioner, PV Saravanan, a farmer, there are nearly 4450 PACS in Tamil Nadu consisting of nearly 90 lakh members. The manpower available in the PACS is disproportionate to the total number of farmers who want to avail the farm loan and therefore, it will take a long time to open a mirror account for every farmer.
A method has to be devised to expedite the opening of the accounts by bringing in more manpower to collect the applications from the farmers and submit them to the Central Co-operative Bank branches, he added.
The Central Co-operative Banks submitted to the court that in 36
districts after the July 7 order, a total of 2,90,033 farmers have availed the loan after the opening of the mirror account and a total of Rs 2256.21 crores have been disbursed.
Recording the submissions made by the state and Centre, Justice Anand Venkatesh ordered the Registrar of Co-operative Societies to file a report to expedite the process of opening the mirror accounts. The court also sought the assistance of NABARD in getting details on the process carried out in other states.