Waived loans being recovered from farmers in Chitral

By Zar Alam Khan

ISLAMABAD: Farmers in the Mastuj subdivision of Chitral have accused the National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) of forcibly recovering loans waived by the federal government over a year back.

Talking to this correspondent on telephone, they said they had availed small agricultural loans amounting to a maximum limit of Rs50,000 from the bank in the year 2008. In May 2009, the federal government waived all loans outstanding on June 30, 2009, in the wake of the law and order problem and subsequent military operation in the Malakand Division of which Chitral is a district.

However, the then manager of the bank, Mr Ehsanullah, forced the people to return the loans saying the bank had not received the official notification. Many of the loan takers refused to pay back the amount. However, those who had money in their accounts at the branch later found their cash forfeited. Besides, low level government employees who had also taken loans from the bank were deprived of their salaries in lieu of the loans. In all, about 200 people were denied the facility.

A senior official in the bank requesting not to be named told Dawn that the recovery was illegal and a blatant violation of rules. He said after announcement by the federal government to waive the loans, the State Bank had issued notification to all the banks. He said the said bank branch was suffering losses and under pressure from the top officials the former manager made the ‘illegal’ recovery from the accounts of the people.

When contacted, Mr Ehsanullah defended the recovery and claimed that by the time he received the State Bank notification on December 12, 2009, all recovery amounting to Rs4.3 million had been made on the directives of the authorities concerned. He, however, acknowledged that the recovered amount should have been reimbursed to the people.

The affected persons called upon the federal government and the authorities of the bank to take action against the official for violating banking rules and denying the loan waiver facility to them.–Dawn