Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur met Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at New Delhi today. The Chief Minister apprised the Finance Minister that State Cooperative Banks have not been made member lending institutions under Credit Guarantee Fund Trust for Micro and Small Enterprises (CGTMSE) and Small Farmers Agri-Business Consortium (SFAC) due to that potential entrepreneurs were not getting collateral free loans facility under various GoI flagship programmes like MUDRA, PMEGP, NRLM, NULM etc. He requested for personal intervention in the matter to ensure facilitating easy and hassle free credit facility under various GoI schemes to the target groups through Cooperative Banks.
Jai Ram Thakur said that this would not only help the Cooperative Banks in expanding their credit portfolios but also go a long way in generating employment, creating livelihood as well as growth and diversification of agriculture and agro based industries due to the hassle free credit advancement and collateral free credit facility.
Chief Minister also urged for intervention regarding persuading the World Bank to continue to fund the Integrated Development Project for source sustainability and climate resilient rain fed agriculture (IDP) as a separate project. He informed that IDP and Forest for Prosperity (FPP) were merged taking the view that both projects were being implemented by same department and have contiguous objectives and outcomes.
He however explained the Finance Minister that objectives and implementation strategies of both projects were different and added that objectives of IDP was to address agrarian sector and mitigating the effects of climate change, improving the availability of water for irrigation to increase agricultural productivity and livelihood of farmers by directly working with gram panchayats. He informed that on other hand FPP was core forestry project aimed at improving management and community use of forest and alpine pastures.
He said that concerns of the state regarding fund requirements in the project have not been rightly considered by the World Bank while recommending the merger and requested for separate funds for IDP for its effective implementation.
Arun Jaitley assured to provide all possible help in these matters.
Dr. Shrikant Baldi Additional Chief Secretary, Ram Subhag Singh ACS Tourism, Sanjay Kundu Additional Principal Secretary to Chief Minister accompanied the Chief Minister.
