For its inclusive banking and expansion in rural areas with establishment of 35 easy payment units in Himalayan district of Leh in Jammu and Kashmir, J&K Bank was conferred with SKOCH Award in ‘Banking and Finance (B&F) Silver Category’ at New Delhi on Sunday.
The award was conferred by the chairman, SKOCH Group Sameer Kochchar and MD & editor SKOCH Gursharan Dhanjal to the J&K Bank chairman and CEO Parvez Ahmed at the 55th SKOCH Summit held at the Constitution Club of India, New Delhi. While the summit was inaugurated by Union minister for commerce and industry Suresh Prabhu, who was conferred the Golden Jubilee SKOCH Challenger Award, 2018.
The 55th SKOCH Summit was themed on the economic manifesto in which various speakers including noted economists participated. The summit also held panel discussion on ‘Deciphering Digital Economy Policy’ and ‘Ambassadors of Soft Power India’ by eminent domain experts and politicians bringing leading politicians and experts from politics, finance, technology and diplomacy on one platform.
J&K Bank also received two Order of Merit citations having been rated and qualified on three parameters; early evaluation, jury evaluation and popular vote which were received by Parvez Ahmed in the presence of president and zonal head Ladakh Chetan Paljor and zonal head Delhi Fayaz Siddiqui.
While dedicating the recognition to the people of Leh, the chairman reiterated bank’s commitment to serve the people to the last mile through its round the year services regardless of climatic or topographic challenges.
“We intend to map the whole geography in the state in such a manner that nobody in the state should be travelling more than 5-10 Km for availing the banking facilities. The aim is to formalize the savings to channelize for productive deployment besides unshackling the people from the exploitative informal channels of lending,” chairman said, adding, “The bank upon the success of the Payment Units in Leh-Ladakh will now be scaling the model to other remote and challenging locations of the state of Jammu and Kashmir.”