Wednesday 11 June, 2008

Letter to Shri Sharad Pawar, Honorable Minister of Agriculture, Government of India

Respected Sir,

I wish to bring to your notice the following.

1. I, along with some likeminded people have been spearheading a fight against foreign banks vis-à-vis CitiBank, Standard Chartered, ICICI, American Express, ABN Amro, etc under the banner of Credit Consumers Association of India. We are a not-for-profit organization.

2. We have raised our voice against various malpractices of these banks in the matter of unsecured lending and their harsh recovery practices. These recovery practices have lead to the deaths of many people who have been mentally and physically tortured by these banks. Media reports against recovery processes and methods adopted by these banks abound.

3. We have also represented our case in front of RBI, which is the regulating body of these banks, and done several public demonstrations to bring to notice of RBI about these malpractices.

4. In response to our demands and representations RBI has now woken up to the demon of easy credit and recovery processes and has issued a set of guidelines to all banks. RBI has also threatened to take action against them for non-compliance of these guidelines. But ground reality is that there has been no effect of all this posturing of RBI. The harassment continues unabated.

5. We have also approached the Honorable Home Minister, Mr. R.R. Patil regarding the difficulties faced by our members as Police Departments are insensitive to complaints of harassment which border on extortion. Although the honorable minister assured us that he will call a joint meeting of all concerned parties, he has miserably failed to do so, a development which we find hard to digest. He had personally promised me that as this is a very good public cause and that as follow-up on this will definitely help the party’s image, he would take necessary and urgent action in this matter. I fail to understand why he has not done anything since the last four months.

6. Sir, under the Bombay Money Lenders Act 1946, the maximum interest that can be charged is fixed at 21% with provision of periodic review. This rate of interest currently stands at 15% p.a. This act was meant to primarily protect the common people from exploitation of private money lenders. These foreign banks, hiding behind the exemption from this act, charge up to 75% interest per annum. These interest rates are usurious and exploitative to say the least. We fail to understand as to how the authorities can have a different yard stick for levying of interest for private money lenders and those covered under the Banking Regulation Act? Is exploitation by one lender allowed while prohibited by the other?

Sir, if the party were to take credit for the fight that I have taken up, it becomes important that I and the association be supported by all the members of the party.

In my effort to bring to fore the problems of lending, the association has also been slapped with criminal charges when a demonstration at Standard Chartered Bank went wrong due to unprovoked anger of the demonstrators. Some property of the bank was damaged in the heat of the moment. I and some other members are being prosecuted as criminals in an alleged case of dacoity at the banks premises even though we had given adequate advance notice to the local police station of the planned demonstration and the demonstration happened in the presence of police officers of the local police station. I do not mind suffering for the greater cause, but you will agree that this is a fit case for wholehearted support from the party.

Therefore, with much hope, I write to you. I am sure you will give necessary directions to all concerned to help us in this noble and great fight that I have taken up on behalf of the common people.

Thanking you,
Yours truly,


Vijay Kamble.
President
Credit Consumers Association of India

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