With an eye on the assembly constituencies in the mining belt, the cabinet on Monday granted approval to the re-introduction of the debt relief scheme for mining-affected borrowers of financial institutions, which will have an additional burden of Rs 11 crore on the state exchequer.
The cabinet note stated that since there was a request from stakeholders for further extension of the scheme, the request was forwarded to the government for a decision, however, in the meantime, the scheme expired on March 31 last year, thanks to which the CM had directed that the scheme be reintroduced for one year.
The borrowers who availed of credit facilities for barges, trucks, tippers, mining machinery/equipment from various financial institutions were unable to meet their repayment commitments, a senior official said. The non-performing assets (NPA) of the financial institutions increased substantially due to mining loans, especially in the co-operative sector.
During the last cabinet meeting, the state granted approval to a new policy for handling of mining dumps outside and inside mining leases through auctioning by the and allowing lessees to handle the dumps to restart mining activities in the state. Around 20 million tonnes of iron Ore are lying in the form of dumps.
The state has decided to auction mining leases. The government had identified eight mining leases to be auctioned, which are in Sattari and Bicholim talukas. Sawant had set a deadline to e-auction mining leases by December 15, but they have not yet been auctioned.