Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy released the State Annual Credit Plan (ACP) for the year 2022-23 with a total outlay of ₹3,19,480 crore, at the 219th State Level Bankers’ Committee (SLBC) meeting on Thursday.
Of the total outlay, 54% of the loans has been earmarked for the agriculture sector. It has been is targeted to extend ₹1,64,740 crore as loans in the agriculture sector and ₹2,35,680 crore as loans to the primary sector, which is 73.76% of State annual credit plan.
Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Jagan urged the bankers to redouble their efforts to lend more credit to support the downtrodden to withstand the pressure of inflation. The banks had to assess why they couldn’t achieve agriculture term loan targets in the Kharif season. The bankers had to take measures to achieve targets in regard to farm mechanisation and poultry and also to focus on providing loans to tenant farmers, he said.
In the same breath, he said that it was commendable that despite the constraints, the annual credit plan target for 2020–21 had been surpassed to 133.19%. The banks had achieved 167.27% more than the target of annual credit plan in terms of agriculture term loan and the loans were doubled at 208.48% for non-primary sectors, he said.
Target surpassed
The Chief Minister said COVID-led economic disruptions had had a debilitating impact on the country’s growth path and this was the first year that economic growth could be seen. The nominal GDP of the country for 2021-22 was ₹237 lakh crore and the growth at current prices during that year as per the provisional estimates was 19.5%. The inflation at 7.79% was highest witnessed in the last eight years, and also the inflation at rural areas was 8.38% due to which the Reserve Bank has increased the cash reserve ratio and repo rates and it would have an impact on downtrodden people and also a negative impact on the manufacturing sector, he observed.
The Chief Minister said the State government had been providing ₹10,000 interest-free loan to small vendors and artisans engaged in traditional handicrafts through banks, and the banks had given loans to 14.15 lakh beneficiaries. He asked the bankers to continue it.
Mr. Jagan said banks had provided 90.55% of loans to MSMEs in 2021-21 which was less than the target and urged the bankers to focus in this regard. He urged the bankers to focus on providing loans to poor for constructing houses and also to tie-up with TIDCO houses beneficiaries and said construction of houses would help for the growth of the financial sector.
Agriculture Minister Kakani Govardhan Reddy, Chief Secretary Sameer Sharma, Agriculture Special Chief Secretary Poonam Malakondaiah, Industries Special Chief Secretary Karikal Valaven, Finance Special Chief Secretary S.S. Rawat, Panchayat Raj and Rural Development Principal Secretary Gopala Krishna Dwivedi, Social Welfare Principal Secretary M.M. Naik, SLBC convenor V. Bramhananda Reddy, Union Bank of India Executive Director Nidhu Saxena, RBI Regional Director K Nikhila, NABARD Chief General Manager M.R. Gopal and other representatives of various banks were present in the meeting.
