-The Hindu It allows employers to extend unlimited advances to workers and charge an unspecified interest rate on such loans Debt bondage is a form of slavery that exists when a worker is induced to accept advances on wages, of a size, or at a level of interest, such that the advance will never be repaid. One of India’s hastily-passed Labour Codes — the Code on Wages, 2019 — gives legal sanction...
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Stop chasing profits at customers' expense, RBI Deputy Governor tells MFIs
-The Hindu The RBI deputy governor reminded the industry that their customers often have lower level of financial awareness and literacy and ‘are often too desperate to turn away any source of credit’. Micro-finance lenders must refrain from chasing profits and introspect on the ‘negative consequences’ of pushing their borrowers into a Debt trap, using harsh recovery practices and harassing customers as this could undo the sector’s progress, a top central banker...
More »IMF’s Issue of Fresh SDRs -Prabhat Patnaik
-Networkideas.org The International Monetary Fund has announced a fresh issue of $650 billion Special Drawing Rights in August which would be distributed among member countries in proportion to their IMF quotas. This amount is less than what had been demanded by many, which was a trillion dollars, but it does represent a small temporary comfort for the heavily indebted third world countries. Almost all of it will go into the pockets of...
More »Amidst Rain, Kisan Sansad Takes on Contract Farming -Indra Shekhar Singh
-TheWire.in 'They made us buy seeds and fertilisers when the market prices crashed. Then, Pepsi said my produce didn’t meet their grade.' New Delhi: It rained all day as another session of the Kisan Sansad (farmers’ parliament) was in progress. Even a neem tree and a canopy couldn’t keep the Sansad venue from getting drenched. But this was no deterrent for those in attendance. The topic for the day was the Contract Farming...
More »Trafficking survivors took more loans at higher rates, finds study -Shiv Sahay Singh
-The Hindu Second wave of COVID-19 forced vulnerable women to take high risk loans beyond their repaying capacity Kolkata: Months after she was rescued, 16-year-old Asma, a resident of Sunderbans in South 24 Parganas, took a loan of ₹20,000 from local moneylenders in May 2020 to rebuild her life. The first wave of COVID-19 had made it difficult to get any work. A year later, in May 2021, Ms. Asma, who was...
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