Srinagar: 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 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.
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 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.
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 the scale of finance in the Agri and allied sectors.
He urged for the 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 focused manner on SC/ST/OBC sections of the society for inclusive growth.
Chief Secretary impressed upon banks to desist from seeking collaterals for 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 of J&K Bank, Syed Rais Maqbool while making a presentation on the financial achievements of various banks in different sectors during the first two quarters of the 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.
