-PTI About Rs. 1.47 lakh crore of agricultural loans are outstanding in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh Asian Development Bank (ADB) Country Director Kenichi Yokoyama Friday said farm loan waivers were against economic principles and cannot effectively address the agrarian distress. Yokoyama also advocated for direct transfer of funds to targeted beneficiaries as it would cut down leakages. On farm loan waiver, he said most of the people are sceptical about it as an...

-The Hindu Business Line The Centre and States must eschew the politically expedient option of loan waivers and look for long-term solutions The sweeping wave of loan waivers has generated serious debates across the country on their economics and likely outcomes. Till date 12 States have announced loan waiver amounting to more than Rs.2 lakh crore. Loan waiver cannot be a solution to address the agrarian crisis, instead the government must look for...

-The Hindu Five issues need to be addressed comprehensively if India is to achieve sustained high growth The New Year is always looked forward to with hope, whatever the conditions might have been the previous year; 2018 has been a mixed bag, both globally and domestically. Globally, the growth rate in 2018 was high, particularly in the United States. But strong signs of a trade war emerged, dimming hopes of faster international trade....

-The Indian Express There were 5,917 instances of bank fraud in 2017-18 as against 5,076 cases the previous year, show the data released Friday. Fraudsters have looted Rs 41,167.7 crore from the banking system in 2017-18, a sharp jump of 72 per cent from Rs 23,933 crore the previous year, despite “stringent monitoring and vigilance”, according to data released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). There were 5,917 instances of bank...

-The Economic Times The world is no stranger to farm debt crises like the one India is seeing today. Back in the 1980s, the Canadian parliament enacted a law to stop foreclosures on farm debt, after prices collapsed and interest rates jumped to as high as 24%. The law was in force for a dozen-odd years. It identified insolvent farmers, facilitated agreements between the borrowers and lenders, and helped some farmers move...