A study on farmers perception towards agricultural finance provided by various sectors of banks in tirunelveli district tamilnadu

Abstract

Thiruvalluvar says, Those who cultivate their food live in self-sufficiency all others follow him in self made dependence . On Oct 29th 2011 The Hindu on its first page reported, Over a Quarter million farmers committed suicide between 1995 - 2010. It is highly distressing that farmers who feed the nation end their lives due to the burden of debt. Is Thiruvalluvar proved wrong? There are three essential needs the people must have Khan, Kapda Our Makan . The above priority also goes wrong. So A study on farmers perception with reference to agricultural finance is taken. Small is beautiful . Since farmers hold small size of land, banks frown upon their loans. They are driven to money lenders and get loans. Consequently they suffer. The data required for the study have been collected from both the primary and secondary sources. Stratified random sampling in selecting banks and purposive sampling for farmers in Tirunelveli form the fulcrum of this study. The data have been collected from 480 (60 banks × 8 farmers) respondents. Finally 450 respondents were shortlisted after elimination of 30 respondents. The following statistical tools namely, Chi-square Test, Correlation, Factor Analysis, One-way ANOVA, Turkey Test, Mean Score and Weighted Average methods have been used for analysis. Though majority of the farmers wish to maintain their accounts in Regional Rural Banks, Cooperative Banks, Public Sector Banks and Private Sector Banks etc., they fall in the clutches of Private Money Lenders. Default repayments outdo regular repayment of loans. Some prominent suggestions: provision of finance commensurate with operations, post of agricultural field experienced banking officials and in time finance to meet the social conditions of the farmers. People bow low when they think of the farmers in abstract terms. In reality their sufferings know no bounds. To quote, Dr. M. S. Swami Nathan, father of the Green Revolution, Future Belongs to Nations with Grains and not Guns . newline