Banks should play a vital role in ensuring a balanced and overall growth of the district by strengthening the credit flow for non-farm sector. Although the district is primarily agrarian, its non-farm potential should be tapped, said Jayashree Muralidharan, District Collector.
Addressing bank officials after releasing the annual credit plan for 2014-15, which envisages an outlay of Rs. 4,648.71 crore, the Collector said that agriculture outlay was pegged at Rs. 2,921.30 crore; non-farm sector at Rs. 600.75 crore and Rs. 1,126.66 crore for other priority sectors (24.24 per cent).
The credit projection for agriculture was significant. However, for achieving a balanced development on the lines of the adjoining Namakkal, Coimbatore, and Erode districts, the bank officials should come forward to encourage the non-farm sector, Ms. Muralidharan added.
Underlining the role of bank officials in motivating and encouraging entrepreneurs, the Collector said that any prolonged delay would likely result in apprehension among the small and medium entrepreneurs, forcing them to desist from their venture.
RecoveryThe Collector advised the bank officials, particularly those of private sector banks, not to resort to any distraint procedures against farm loan defaulters. “A national-level policy decision has been taken in this regard and the nodal officers should inform their branch managers not to harass farm loan defaulters,” Ms. Jayashree Muralidharan said.
Pointing out that the failure of monsoon has been causing panic among farmers, the Collector said that a few instances of recovery proceedings against farmers had been reported in the district.
16.33 p.c. riseReviewing the progress of the last year’s achievement, the Collector said that by and large, the banks had exceeded the target in 2013-14. The overall outlay was up by Rs. 652.91 crore which was 16.33 per cent over the last year’s plan. An increase in outlay was quite indicative of the scope for achieving the desired growth in all sectors.
N. Jayaprakash, Assistant General Manager, Reserve Bank;S. Suresh Kumar, District Development Manager, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development; R. Komagan, Project Officer, Mahalir Thittam; and S. Prabakar, Lead District Manager, spoke.
Earlier, the Collector released the annual credit plan and the first copy was received by S. Narasimhan, Chief Regional Manager, Indian Overseas Bank, the lead bank for the district.
