THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The web portal of the Education Loan Repayment Support Scheme, elrs.kerala.gov.in, was inaugurated by beneficiaries here on Friday. The scheme, which finance minister Dr T. M. Thomas Isaac said was unparalleled in the country, has been devised to support students from economically-distressed families who had to take education loans but were unable to repay on time.
The scheme will provide various types of support for education loans that had been categorised as non-performing asset on or before March 31, 2016. Under the first type of assistance, loans up to Rs 4 lakh will be restructured with the state government paying up 60 per cent of the installments that have been in default. The borrower will meet the remaining 40 per cent. The second type of assistance is the one-time settlement of loans that have become NPA on March 31, 2016.
The state will provide 60 percent of the principal amount. The borrower will pay the remaining amount. The bank will write off the interest. The third type of assistance is for loans between Rs 4 lakh and '9 lakh that have been categorised as NPA on March 31, 2016. The state will provide 50 percent of the loan amount, subject to a maximum of Rs 2.4 lakh. The remaining amount will be restructured by the banks under a special scheme. There will be assistance also for loans for which repayment had started before March 31, 2016, and are not branded NPA. For the repayment of such loans, the state and the borrower will share the annual burden.
"The idea is not to allow any financial difficulty to break the regular payment of installments, and eventually accumulate into a huge burden," Dr Isaac said. The repayment schedule will be 90 per cent in the first year, and 75 percent, 50 percent, and 25 percent in the following years. The assistance will be only for four years. The state will also bear the loan amount of borrowers who had suffered serious physical ailment or had died during the course of study or during the repayment period.
