Money lending law amendment in cold storage since 2008

Published in The Hitavada CityLine on April 2, 2013

Amendment to money lending law in cold storage since 5 yrs

By Kartik Lokhande

When the issue of farmers’ suicides had occupied centre-stage some years back, Maharashtra Home Minister (the then Deputy Chief Minister) R R Patil had announced to punish money lenders hard. The then Chief Minister late Vilasrao Deshmukh, in 2008, had announced that Bombay Money Lending Act would be amended to incorporate stringent punishment for private money lenders exploiting the farmers.

However, despite strong statements by Maharashtra’s top two authorities, the amendment bill is in cold storage since five years. Maharashtra forwarded the Bill to the President’s office, which sent it back with some queries. Savkargrast Shetkari Samiti has been following up the issue and it staged demonstrations at Azad Maidan in January this year to register protest against State Government’s inaction in this regard. The Bill comprised an important amendment enabling farmers to get back their land usurped by private money lenders.

While the Government is issuing/renewing licences to private money lenders, it has not ensured speedier passage of Bombay Money Lending (Amendment) Act since 2008. This exposes the Government’s intentions, alleged MLA Devendra Fadnavis. Acccording to him, the Bill’s passage is being delayed as restoring possession of land from money lenders to farmers is the key issue.

Sources in Co-operation Department brought out another angle of the story. According to them, in many cases, money lenders got farmers’ land transferred in their names as the farmers defaulted in loan payment owing to usurious rate of interest. Money lenders were smart enough to get such a ‘land deal’ registered. “Previously, when we had made attempts to cancel such registries, our action did not stand in court of law as registry made the land deals perfectly legal under Indian Registration Act,” said an official familiar with the issue.

Making amendments to Bombay Money Lending Act would not suffice, said sources. If land is to be returned to farmers, enabling provisions would have to be incorporated through amendments in Indian Registration Act also.


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