The finance ministry has asked public sector banks to devise products for Indian farmers to ensure they get adequate funding in emergencies. The government, the majority owner of such banks, wants them to roll out products such as emergency loans to farmers that will be linked to savings accounts, a weather index-based insurance product, and set up a credit guarantee fund that will aid farmers in the event of crop losses...

-The Business Standard   The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) has recorded a 40 per cent growth in agriculture credit and rural development in Karnataka during 2011-12. It has extended farm credit of Rs 6,053 crore during the year. While the production credit refinance extended to cooperative banks and regional rural banks (RRBs) was Rs 3,775 crore, its finance to state government under the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF)...

  For women, the NREGA would bring important social gains   Not being an expert on the subject and too lazy to read all the fine print, I do not know the exact allocations under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act this year. But I gather the money has been cut down, largely because the sums allocated last year were not fully used by most states. Maybe there were other considerations...

In this year's budget, Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has essentially tried to consolidate the gains from the initiatives he had launched during the previous two budgets. Thus, in agriculture there is no new initiative except increasing the target for agricultural credit to Rs.5,75,000 crore during 2012-13. This represents an increase of over Rs.1,00,000 crore from last year. The interest rate of four per cent recommended by the National Commission...

-The Telegraph Bengal’s co-operation department spent the better part of Tuesday on an unusual mission: how to enforce Mamata Banerjee’s very chief ministerial order to nail those who tried to recover money lent by a co-operative bank. “I have asked to lodge an FIR,” Mamata had declared yesterday while ordering the withdrawal of attachment notices on two farmers and announcing that the law will be changed to make government approval mandatory before...