Employment generation Govt’s major challenge: Chief Secretary

Srinagar, Oct 19: Government is committed to bring down the unemployment in J&K and the financial sector needs to put in a place an actionable mechanism to saturate the self-employment in J&K by the end of November 2022.This was stated by the Chief Secretary, Dr Arun Kumar Mehta while chairing the 8th Union Territory Level Bankers’ Committee meeting in Srinagar to review achievements of banks and financial institutions operating in Jammu and Kashmir for the half year ended September 2022.
He said banks now need to move towards sustainable, equitable and outcome based banking for sustained gains.
Additional Chief Secretary, Agriculture Production Department, Atal Dulloo, Principal Secretary, Industries & Commerce Department, Prashant Goyal, MD& CEO, J&K Bank (Convenor J&K UTLBC) Baldev Prakash, Administrative Secretaries of various Departments, Chief General Manager, NABARD, Dr. A. K. Sood and other senior functionaries of the Government, RBI, NABARD, Banks, line departments, insurance companies were also present on the occasion. Joint Secretary, Department of Financial Services, GoI Pankaj Sharma, District Development Commissioners of all districts of J&K and Lead District Managers joined the meeting virtually.
In his opening remarks, the Chief Secretary, Dr Mehta stated that employment generation is the major challenge of the Government and it is the collective responsibility of all stakeholders to address the issue.
“Banks need to come forward and provide financial assistance to the unemployed youth for achieving the gainful employment. We need to show empathy towards the unemployed youth in guiding them towards the path of prosperity and self-sufficiency through various credit facilities tailored in accordance to their entrepreneurial aspirations. We have to create an environment where youth have to think beyond Government jobs and strengthen avenues to self-employment,” he said.
Earlier in his welcome address MD & CEO J&K Bank (Convenor J&K UTLBC) Baldev Prakash assured J&K Government that banks operating in J&K will extend all possible support for implementing the programmes and schemes aimed at entrepreneurial development, employment generation and poverty alleviation in Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir.
While appreciating banks for 100% coverage of the unbanked villages by opening of banking touch points under National Strategy for Financial Inclusion Programme, Dr Mehta impressed upon the banks to cover remaining one village under roadmap of opening banking outlets in villages having population over 5000 expeditiously. He directed banks to expedite the roll out of brick and mortar branches in 10 identified villages with population over 3000.
The Chief Secretary reiterated his earlier direction to IT department, J&K Government to come up with a single portal for all employment generation schemes integrating all departments and banks in J&K.
Financial Literacy in real terms, he said, was bringing more people under the ambit of banking. “Banks should work in tandem with education department to make sure all school going children have bank account which is real measure of success of financial literacy and financial Inclusion.”
Dr Mehta impressed upon the Banks to take advantage of the B2V4 programme commencing from October 27, 2022 for disseminating the information on various products/ schemes to the grass root level and identifying the prospective aspirants.
Dr Mehta said that farmers ‘views need to be considered in the fixation of scale of finance in the agri and allied sectors.
He urged for upsurge in credit off take under Mission Youth saying, “I am of the belief that Mission Youth Schemes are the most attractive schemes and more youth need to be covered under the scheme.” He said self employment schemes need to be targeted in a focussed manner on SC/ST/OBC sections of the society for inclusive growth.
While hailing J&K’s performance under PM SVANidhi, he said “J&K performance is amongst the best in the country and Banks would need to expedite disbursal of 2nd instalment under PM SVANidhi to the eligible beneficiaries in a time bound manner.”
Chief Secretary impressed upon banks to desist from seeking collaterals for the loans where it is not required under norms and operate within the ambit of the RBI norms/GOI schemes in the course of processing of loan requests.
Earlier General Manager J&K Bank, Syed Rais Maqbool while making presentation on the financial achievements of various banks in different sectors during the first two quarters of Financial year 2022-23 informed that banks in J&K have achieved 44% of the Target under Annual Credit Plan by disbursing credit of Rs.22,541.45 Crore to 7,46,141 beneficiaries. Agriculture and MSME sectors have performed well in the priority sector lending.
It was informed that against the Annual Target to cover 29,710 beneficiaries during FY 2022-23 banks have sanctioned loans to the tune of Rs.955.54 Crore to 24,225 beneficiaries under six major employment generation schemes during the first half year of FY 2022-23.
He informed that Rs.202.93 Crore have been disbursed to 3,104 beneficiaries under schemes of Mission Youth upto September 30, 2022.
It was further informed that 14,703 KCCs (crop) and 15,543 KCC (AH) have been issued during first half of financial year 2022-23 and near saturation has been achieved under the programme.
Against the quarterly target of holding 651 financial literacy camps, 866 financial literacy camps have been organized during the quarter ending September 2022.
He further said that the aggregate CD ratio in J&K has increased from 56.58% as on 30.09.2021 to 58.46% as on 30.09.2022.