National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) today asked Haryana state to improve its cooperative loan recovery particularly in case of long term credit.
"Yes, recovery should improve particularly for long term cooperative bank which is Haryana agricultural and rural development bank. There is enough room for further improvement in recovery," NABARD Chairman H K Bhanwala told reporters here today.
He was asked to respond on "poor" recovery of cooperative loans to farmers in Haryana.
Notably, state-owned Haryana State Cooperative Agriculture Rural & Development Bank Ltd (HSCARDB) is yet to recover Rs 1,300 crore from farmers which has been pending for the last 4-5 years.
Haryana government had even launched a One Time Settlement Scheme for loan defaulters last year where in 50 per cent interest liability and penal interest would be waived.
An official of (HSCARDB) said that so far, Rs 125 crore had been recovered under OTS launched from farmers and another Rs 200 crore was expected to be recovered.
However, he said cooperative loan recovery in Punjab was good.
With regard to Punjab government demand for funds for modernisation of milk plants, Bhanwala said that Nabard had suggested to the state that funds could be provided under Rural Infrastructure Development Fund.
On credit support, Bhanwala said that Nabard had provided credit support under short term and medium term to the extent of Rs 55,000 crore to Punjab and Rs 45,000 crore to Haryana since inception.
Under RIDF, as assistance of Rs 6,360 crore has been sanctioned to Punjab government and Rs 4,272 crore to Haryana government till now, he said.
He further said Nabard is providing support for technology upgradation of rural financial institutions by way of Core Banking Solutions of cooperative banks and RRBs, which will further help these banks to issue 'Rupay' Kisan Cards to farmers.
"The technical savvy platform in these banks will enable them to have a level playing field at par with commercial banks, which will result into retention/expansion of the client base in rural areas," he said.
Acting on the suggestion of Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, Bhanwala said Nabard would fund the state government for integrated development of micro infrastructure at village level by adopting one village per district.
