State Level Bankers’ Committee Meet held
By Our Staff Reporter
Dehradun, 3 Dec: Finance Secretary Dilip Jawalkar today urged public sector banks to prioritise lending to agriculture and self-employment activities in rural areas. Addressing the State Level Bankers’ Committee meeting at the Secretariat here, today, Jawalkar observed that the performance of public sector banks in these areas has been very unsatisfactory compared to private sector banks, which is not acceptable. He strongly urged that in line with their main objective, public sector banks should maximise loans to enrich the rural economy and livelihood.
Jawalkar also urged all the bankers to identify beneficiaries by establishing better coordination with various departments and set targets for providing benefits to the identified beneficiaries. He further asked them to strictly monitor the progress to achieve the targets. The Finance Secretary insisted that the districts with unsatisfactory credit-deposit (CD) ratios should create micro plans to increase their progress, and the district concerned should thoroughly review them.
It was shared at the meeting that the overall CD ratio of the state from July to September 2024 was 53.26 percent, down from 54 percent in the previous quarter. The CD ratio of private banks in the quarter was 84.57 percent, while that of nationalised banks was merely 42.33 percent. Important suggestions to increase the CD ratio were also put forward by officials from RBI, NABARD, and other banks.
It may be recalled that, to increase the CD ratio in the state, the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, Ministry of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries, Government of India has organised a nationwide AHDF KCC campaign from 15 September 2024 to 31 March 2025. Under this campaign, Uttarakhand has been given the target of opening 5,000 KCC accounts. Banks are expected to provide maximum loans in this campaign. It was also suggested at the meeting that the CD ratio can also be increased by providing bank loan facilities to various industrial units/projects identified by the Industry Department in the Global Investor Summit 2023. Jawalkar insisted that along with large loans in agriculture and the MSME sector, there should also be a focus on a large number of small loans, and these should be provided to micro and small units established in the state.
During the meeting, AGM RBI Dheeraj Kumar Arora, AGM SLBC Rajiv Pant, Assistant General Manager NABARD Shobhana Singh, Joint Director of Tourism SS Samant, and other leading bankers and officials were present.
