NEW DELHI | PUNE: Post demonetisation, Manjit Singh, a farmer in Punjab, is grappling with a new financial reality — a queer mix of debit and credit in cashstarved villages where farmers are beginning to get some payments in cheques while their suppliers want currency notes.
The vegetable and paddy farmer from Malerkotla is yet to receive Rs 35,000 from commission agents who took his produce. He has bought diesel and fertiliser on credit of Rs 20,000 — half of it taken from somebody from whom he had never borrowed before — a petrol pump owner. “I have to pay Rs 10,000 to the petrol pump owner for the diesel I bought, Rs 6,000 to the cooperative society and Rs 4,000 to the labourers. I am concerned that any of these days, the petrol pump guy will land up at my house for the money,” he says.
Farmers are worried about the new debt they are taking with interest rates as high as 36% to make sure they are able to plant and look after the new crop after demonetisation disrupted the cash-based village economy. Many farmers say they are being forced to sell produce at prices far lower than market rates.
Please click here to read more.