Consider applications for government-sponsored schemes on priority, ZP CEO tells banks

Udupi Zilla Panchayat CEO Prateek Bayal on Tuesday asked banks in the district to consider applications for schemes sponsored by State and Central governments, recommended by competent authorities, on priority basis.

He was chairing the district bankers’ committee meeting at Rajatadri, the district headquarters in Manipal. While 5,661 applications were received under the PM Vishwakarma Scheme, 1,337 were rejected. Banks have disbursed ₹35.29 crore credit to 3,937 beneficiaries, he said adding the number of rejected applications should considerably come down. He asked banks to take immediate steps to dispose of pending applications.

Mr. Bayal noted that banks have disbursed ₹10.06 crore credit to 91 beneficiaries of the target of 129 under the PM Employment Generation Scheme. The scheme intended to support budding entrepreneurs and create new jobs. Banks should not keep any applications pending, he said.

Annual credit plan

The CEO said while the annual credit plan for the district, both priority and non-priority sectors, was fixed at ₹15,514.16 crore, the disbursement so far has been ₹8,941.11 crore, that is, 57.63% of the target. In the agriculture sector, ₹2.274 crore was disbursed as against ₹4,230 crore target while for MSME sector, the disbursal was ₹2,426 crore as against the target of ₹3,713 crore and so on.

Reserve Bank of India lead district officer Nisha Thakur said the credit to deposit ratio in any district should not be less than 50% and urged banks to improve their performance.

Canara Bank Regional General Manager Mahamaya Prasad Roy said the CD ratio of banks in the district improved slightly, from 47.66% in the previous financial year to to 48.62% in the current year. It was unfortunate that the ratio has been below 50%, he said urging all banks to work on improving credit disbursal.

NABARD Deputy Divisional Manager Sangeeta Kartha and others were present.