To provide self employment opportunities for the people of the State returning from different parts of the country due to the crisis precipitated by the novel Coronavirus, the State Govt has directed the cooperative banks to provide loans to them. The State Minister for cooperatives, higher education and dairy development, Dhan Singh Rawat said that the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) has agreed to provide a sum of Rs 2000 Crore to the cooperative banks of Uttarakhand for granting loans. The Minister was addressing a meeting with the officials of the cooperative department and NABARD at his office in Vidhan Sabha on Friday. In the meeting the Minister reviewed the agriculture loans provided by the cooperative banks in the last year and set targets for this financial year. He said that the NABARD has agreed in principal on providing Rs 2000 Crore for the Cooperative banks and the State and district cooperative banks of Uttarakhand should take benefit from the offer. He said that the cooperative banks should increase their reach and provide loans to maximum number of people. Informing about the loans provided by the cooperative banks, the Managing Director (MD) of the Cooperative Bank, Deepak Kumar said that the cooperative banks of the State had achieved the target of Rs 1400 Crore given by the state government for distribution of crop loans last year. He exuded confidence that this year also the target of Rs 2000 would be completed before time.
The Minister said that about 2 lakh Uttarakhandis have returned recently from different parts of the country and the state cooperative banks are ready to help them for self employment. In the meeting Rawat directed the officials to undertake rapid computerisation of the cooperative committees. He said that like last year, the every district cooperative banks would be provided with one mobile van this year.
In the meeting the registrar cooperative societies, B M Mishra, MD state cooperative bank Deepak Kumar, General Manager (GM) of NABARD, S L Birla and others were present.