Agri Dept directs TS Collectors to hold meet over disbursal of crop loans

Hyderabad: Taking cognisance of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report, the Agriculture Department on Wednesday issued directions to all District Collectors to immediately conduct District Consultative Committee (DCC) and District Level Review Committee (DLRC) meetings to review disbursal of crop loans to farmers.

The Agriculture Secretary C Partha Sarathi wrote a letter to District Collectors and asked them to convene review meetings at the earliest. He asked them to have regular meetings to ensure that tangible progress was made in Rabi lending in crop loan disbursement and term loan lending.

During the PAC meeting, some committee members said the lending of crop loans by banks during Kharif 2017-18 was poor in certain districts though some districts performed well. The Agriculture Department also found that the bankers’ performance in disbursal of term loans was poor in agriculture sector.

Based on these findings, the Agriculture Secretary wanted meetings to be convened immediately with the involvement of public representatives such as MPs, MLAs and MLCs to mount pressure on local banks to disburse loans. The DCC and DLRC meetings were not being held regularly in districts which was also a reason for low lending rates.