Shivananda Kapashi, CEO of zilla panchayat, said on Thursday that banks should focus on providing education loans to students.
He was chairing the district-level review committee meeting on banking development in Udupi district at the zilla panchayat hall, here.
Mr. Kapashi said the target for providing education loans for the banks was ₹264.6 crore for the fiscal year 2017-18. But the banks had provided education loans to the tune of ₹69 crore till the end of the last fiscal year. He demanded an explanation from the banks for not being able to reach the target. The bank officers said students had to apply for education loans online. But after applying online, if the students wanted to make any modification, it was not possible. This resulted in the applications being rejected, they said. Mr. Kapashi also directed the banks to open their branches in villages having a population of less than 5,000 in the district. The meeting was informed that seven banks in the district had failed to reach their target in deposit collection and that an equal number of banks had not reached the target in providing loans.
P.K. Pattanaik, Assistant General Manager, Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Bengaluru, emphasised on the need to increase Credit Deposit ratio in the district. He stressed on the need for popularising digital banking system. He informed the officers on the guidelines issued by RBI on various issues related to banking activities.
S. Ramesh, AGM, NABARD, reviewed the implementation of the District Credit Plan during the fourth quarter of 2017-18 and advised the banks to concentrate on lending more under Priority Sector as the progress was not satisfactory. He also touched upon NABARD assisted schemes and training programme for branch heads. Nataraja S.E., Deputy General Manager, SyndicateBank, Regional Office, said that during the fourth quarter of 2017-18, the total deposits of the banking sector in Udupi district stood at ₹22,364 crore registering a year-on-year growth of 8.02% and total advances stood at ₹11,252 crore with a year-on-year growth of 10.77 % with Credit Deposit ratio of 50.31%.