Drop or settle cases against farmers: BB to banks

The Bangladesh Bank has told banks to settle cases against farmers who have failed to repay their loans.

In a circular on Monday, it directed the banks to withdraw certificate cases against farmers or reach an understanding to settle them.

Nationalised banks mainly disburse agriculture loans and the maximum number of cases pertaining to them is with such banks.

There are about 200,000 cases against farmers.

The central bank on Feb 16 instructed state-owned banks to find ways to recover loans without filing fresh cases against defaulting farmers.

In its Monday circular, it asked banks to help farmers affected by disasters by either putting off default loan recovery or issuing fresh ones or rescheduling them.

The banks will have to inform the central bank about their monthly progress on settling or withdrawing cases against farmers.

The PDR Act provides for filing cases if loan repayment is not done for three years.

In case of agriculture loans, a debtor becomes a defaulter one year after the expiry of the repayment term.

Monday’s circular asked banks to take steps to ensure the number of certificate cases did not rise.

The central bank told the banks to increase supervision and if necessary, form separate cells, to hasten loan-recovery.

It also advocated raising awareness among farmers about agriculture loans apart from introducing easy instalment and rewarding farmers who paid back loans to encourage others.