Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan wants banks to be ready to write off the loans of Wayanad disaster victims. The Chief Minister was speaking at the meeting of the State Level Bankers’ Committee convened to discuss the relief work in the wake of the Wayanad disaster.
An unparalleled tragedy happened in Wayanad. Most of the disaster victims are agricultural workers. At the same time, the agricultural land was washed away in the disaster, and the nature of the land itself changed. Most of them have taken loans for various purposes like education, housing and agriculture. Don’t lose sight of the fact that there are individuals who have lost entire family members. As far as banks are concerned, only a small fraction of their total financial transactions will be reduced as part of this intervention. Instead of relying on the government’s approach to write off loans at regular intervals, banks should stand by their own means of relief aid.
In the first phase, ten thousand rupees were given through banks. Deducting the EMI of the Grameen Bank loan at Chooralmala from the relief money given to the affected is not correct. Banks should not adopt a mechanistic approach at such stages. The Chief Minister suggested that steps should be taken to waive off the loan in case the top officials of institutions like Reserve Bank and NABARD are participating in the meeting and other banks should follow the example of Kerala Bank. In the meeting, the Chief Minister also pointed out that the country and the world are standing with the state government in rehabilitating the disaster victims in an exemplary manner. Chief Secretary Dr. V. Venu, Additional Chief Secretary Sharada Muralidharan and representatives of various banks attended the meeting.
