Chennai,  The Tamil Nadu cooperative department is to retrieve Rs 160 crore as 37,000 people have been found ineligible for the loan waiver scheme since February this year.

Shanmuga Sundaram, Registrar of Cooperative Societies ordered the revocation of the loan waiver and has directed the joint registrar of cooperatives in each district to incorporate the changes in official records. The order asked the joint registrars to pass the orders to cancel the waiver certificate.

A joint registrar with the Tamil Nadu government told IANS that if any beneficiary is found to have furnished incorrect information to avail the waiver the loan will be recovered in accordance with the existing procedures.

It may be recalled that the DMK government on assuming office had earmarked an amount of Rs 6000 crore for waiving off loans availed by mortgaging gold upto 40 gm till March 31, 2021.

The government issued guidelines in January 2022, which said family members of government employees, cooperative societies and pensioners would not be eligible for the waiver. In addition to this, benefeciaries of crop loan waiver in 2021, ration card holders of no commodity cards and those who have not linked their ration card number and Aadhar with their jewel loan account were also ineligible to avail the benefits.

A team of officials from cooperative department of Tamil Nadu conducted inquiries on the basis of this to scrutinise the records. Sources in the cooperative department told IANS that the laxity of cooperative banks in maintaining the database of the customers is one of the main reasons for many government employees getting the benefit of the scheme.

The department officials said that there were no proper records for those who have availed of loans before 2010.