Vanishing Women, Mounting Debt: Inside West Bengal’s Worsening Microfinance Crisis 

 https://thewire.in/rights/vanishing-women-mounting-debt-inside-west-bengals-worsening-microfinance-crisis “Since 2022, RBI lifted caps on interest rates for MFIs. They use this freedom to trap poor women into multiple loans at exorbitant rates – even 60-70% annually. When women cannot pay, MFIs seize utensils, houses, assets, and even assault women. Some appoint bouncer,” claims Rana Mitra, general secretary of the Nabard employees association. 

March 2025 report of Sa-Dhan, the self-regulatory organisation of private microfinance companies, among the 25 districts in the country where private microfinance penetration is highest, 11 are in Bihar and the next six are in West Bengal.

a national public hearing held in Delhi on August 23-24 this year based on a year-long survey of 9,000 women across 21 states. Over 500 women from 20 states recounted their experiences before a jury – that included former Supreme Court judge Madan B. Lokur, economist Prabhat Patnaik, journalist Pamela Philipose, former AIBOC general secretary Thomas Franco, and advocate Kirti Singh – describing suicides, sexual assault, domestic violence, asset seizures and severe repayment pressure from NBFC-MFIs and fintech lenders. Many said it was the first time they had spoken about their experiences.

Supreme Court grants interim bail to Bhima Koregaon accused Jyoti Jagtap https://www.barandbench.com/news/supreme-court-grants-interim-bail-to-bhima-koregaon-accused-jyoti-jagtap A Bench of Justices MM Sundresh and Satish Chandra Sharma passed the order after it was brought to their notice that Jagtap has been in custody for nearly 5.5 years.

 A close analysis of the 2025 Bihar assembly election reveals a critical detail: in 11 seats, the number of voters removed from the rolls during the pre-election special intensive revision (SIR) was greater than the winner’s margin of victory.

This finding highlights the pre-election debate over the SIR process. The political opposition had warned that the deletions could disproportionately affect the results in tight contests. The final results now allow that claim to be tested with data, identifying the specific battlegrounds where the number of removed voters is higher than the margin separating the winner and the runner-up.

https://thewire.in/politics/bihar-2025-sir-deletions-outnumbered-victory-margins-11-seats 

by Pavan Korada

15/11/2025