Karnataka government says technical glitches delaying payment to silk farmers

At a time when several silk farmers are complaining about payment delays at government cocoon markets, the state said it was aware of the dues.

In a written response to the Legislative Council recently, the government acknowledged the delay in transactions from at least a month. This was due to technical glitches caused by the merger of a few banks, it said.

Farmers, however, said it was a longstanding issue. Apparently, silk farmers coming to the Ramanagara cocoon market are the worst-hit, with dues pending over a year. “Instead of immediately transferring money into our accounts, some reelers assure to make payments through private payment portals. Others give cheques. In the end, we end up making several trips to the market to claim the dues,” one farmer explained.

There are farmers coming from far-off districts including Haveri, Gadag, Raichur, Kalaburagi and Davangere to sell cocoons.

The government’s sericulture secretary Rajender Kumar Kataria said the department had already held meetings in this regard and the issue would be resolved soon. Such instances were not the norm and were hardly 0.5% of cases, he said.

While the department had not made it mandatory for all reelers to have an e-wallet, it would onboard everyone this fiscal. At present, online transactions account for 30-40% of overall transactions, Kataria said.