Hyderabad, March 23: The Andhra Pradesh Government will enact a law in the ongoing Budget session of the state Legislature that will ensure “legal security” to tenant farmers as well as safeguard the rights of the land owners.
“Andhra Pradesh Land Licensed Cultivators Act, 2011” will enable tenant farmers secure institutional finance and also avail of crop insurance which so far has been limited only to land owners, official sources said.
“Primarily, the legislation will enable tenant farmers to get loans from public finance institutions, crop insurance, input subsidy and agricultural inputs which they are so far deprived of,” a senior minister said.
The Cabinet, which met here this evening under the chairmanship of Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, approved the draft legislation, according to the Minister.
The Government has sought to rechristen tenant farmers as “licensed cultivators” through the proposed legislation. The legislation will provide access to institutional credit to tenant farmers without affecting the ownership rights on the land owner, according to the Minister.
“It will be a protective legislation that will take care of the interests of both the land owners as well as the tenant farmers, who hitherto did not enjoy any specific rights or benefits under the existing laws.”
With the efforts of the government, banks extended loans to 15,000 tenant farmers in 2005 and the number rose to 1.5 lakh in 2009-10. In 2010-11, however, only one lakh tenant farmers could get loans from banks and other financial institutions, the Minister pointed out.
–PTI