Here is a real story narrated by my brother-in-law who was a collector in a small town in South India....
In order to help the poor village farmers he started a scheme and provided the people not money, but cows to help them in their economic growth, and they can pay back the money later. The farmers escaped paying the money back to the government by saying that the cows died, and therefore they can not pay back the money. The were not healthy cows it seems. The next policy was no cows were accepted dead until they showed that they actually died. So farmers brought in the pieces of torn ear lobes of cows to prove that they really died and to save the collector from making this long trip to the village. One day the collector decided to make a surprise visit to the village. And what does he see? Entire villages with live cows and missing ear lobes...... So the government changed the policy again this time. No cows were accepted dead till they were physically seen dead. The result... All cows were reported dying on friday nights after the collectors office closed for the weekend. And since there were no resources for preservations, the cows were reportedly burried that same night. The moral of the story is, that farmers are definitely not stupid! But it is inherent in our sytem not to use the money for what it is intended for. If we do not have a system by which a farmer is made accountable the loans will not be fruitful. It will only bring disaster to both parties. There should also be a law that holds a loanee accountable for charging higher than prescribed interests and within some strict guidelines. Mohan R. Palleti _______________________________________________ assam mailing list [email protected] http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org
