Rural households are more in debt vis-a-vis urban households, and account for over 60 per cent of the total debt in the country. The latest data on household indebtedness in India brought out by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) shows that rural households account for roughly 63 per cent of the aggregate outstanding debt which stood at Rs 1,76,795 crore as on June 2002. In absolute terms this works out to Rs 1,11,468 crore. The survey which sampled over 6,500 villages and 3,757 urban blocks, covering 91,192 households in rural areas and 52,093 in urban areas shows that indebtedness was more widespread in rural areas in all the southern states