Personal loans up to Rs 50,000 at 7% interest for prisoners in Maharashtra jails
India Today
Loans will be provided without any guarantee, but the prisoners will have to submit records of income while working in prison.
Prisoners in Maharashtra jails can now avail loans without producing any collateral. The scheme, which aims to reform inmates, will be rolled out at the Yerawada Central Jail in Pune first as a pilot project. The Maharashtra cooperative bank will extend up to Rs 50,000 as loans to the prisoners at an interest rate of seven per cent under the scheme.
The programme was approved at a meeting chaired by state Home Minister Dilip Walse Patil and an order in this regard has also been issued. Loans will be provided without any guarantee, but the prisoners will have to submit records of income while working in prison.
According to Patil, the decision to provide loans to the families of the inmates for their rehabilitation will be the first such loan scheme in the country and it will benefit 1,055 prisoners.
“Since inmates serve long prison terms, their families go through financial distress. Sometimes, the inmates are the earning members of their families. Such detainees may have to spend long periods in jail, leaving their entire family in a state of despair, depression and guilt,” he said.
“A person in jail is seen as a person who has failed in his family duties. Providing a loan to a prisoner for the needs of his family would help to increase the family's sympathy and love for the prisoner and help maintain a healthy family atmosphere,” he added.
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