Civil society leaders urge RBI and banks to provide loan relief amid 2025 monsoon disaster losses

By A Representative 

More than 100 civil society organisations and individuals — including Medha Patkar of Narmada Bachao Andolan, Shaktiman Ghosh of the National Hawkers Federation, Thomas Franco, former General Secretary of the All India Bank Officers Confederation, and environmentalists Soumya Dutta, Ravi Chopra, Disha Ravi and Ashish Kothari, along with collectives such as Himdhara Collective, Friends of the Earth India, National Alliance for Peoples’ Movements, All India Women Hawkers Federation and the Centre for Financial Accountability — have jointly appealed to the Reserve Bank of India, scheduled commercial banks, non-banking finance companies and microfinance institutions for urgent loan relief to households, individuals and small enterprises devastated by the 2025 monsoon disasters. 

The memorandum has also been sent to the Union Finance Minister.

The signatories describe India as facing an unprecedented climate emergency, with this year’s monsoon bringing floods, landslides and cloudbursts that have destroyed lives, homes, crops and livelihoods across Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Assam, Jammu and Kashmir, Maharashtra, Punjab and other states. 

Himachal Pradesh alone reported more than 320 deaths, over 1,200 houses destroyed, and damages worth over ₹3,100 crore, while Uttarakhand’s Dharali–Gangotri corridor saw markets and homes washed away. In Assam, more than 6.3 lakh people were affected and over 14,700 hectares of crops damaged. Maharashtra recorded its second-wettest August in 35 years, with more than 23 lakh acres of farmland ruined, while Jammu and Kashmir reported over 150 deaths and severe losses to horticulture and trade due to blocked highways. In Punjab, more than 50,000 homes were damaged and lakhs of acres submerged, with farm incomes and labour wages collapsing.

The appeal notes that families already burdened with debt, stagnant wages and unemployment have now lost income streams, savings and assets. “Repayment is impossible when homes are washed away, fields buried under silt, and breadwinners have lost work or even their lives. Forcing repayments in such conditions is unjust and contrary to the spirit of financial inclusion,” it states. 

Campaigners stress that what the country faces is not routine credit risk but a “climate-driven financial emergency” that demands a comprehensive and humane response.

The memorandum calls for immediate moratoriums on repayments without penal charges, restructuring of loans in disaster-hit areas, and targeted waivers in cases where repayment capacity has collapsed, such as families who have lost earning members or whose homes and livelihoods have been destroyed. It also urges strict regulation against coercive recovery practices and demands fresh concessional credit to help families rebuild homes, farms and small businesses. 

“Insisting on debt recovery in such circumstances is equivalent to penalising victims for circumstances beyond their control. It risks trapping thousands of households in a cycle of over-indebtedness, default, and social exclusion,” the statement warns.

Recalling the precedent set after the Wayanad landslide, when Kerala Bank announced loan waivers following public demand, the groups argue that such relief must now be scaled nationally. They emphasise that financial institutions must respond with empathy and responsibility, and that relief should be systematic rather than piecemeal.

The appeal concludes with a call for systemic reform in the banking and financial sector to adopt climate-sensitive policies. “India’s banks and NBFCs must adopt a climate-sensitive policy framework. The RBI should publish clear guidelines for moratoriums, restructuring, recovery and waivers in disaster situations. Only then can our financial system claim to be aligned with the realities of a warming world and the rights of its most affected citizens,” the statement says.