Kerala State government has announced a special Kisan Credit Card schemes in the district of Thiruvananthapuram. The drive would be jointly carried out by district banks and state agricultural department covering all eligible farmers. The campaign would be spread over June and July as revealed in the district level review committee on banking. State owned Indian Overseas Bank would be the lead bank in the district. Ten villages were covered under the financial inclusion coverage and banking facilities provided, including banking correspondents (BC). The bank also proposes to run special training for youth of the village to employ them with skills for various jobs. The Rural Self Employment Training Institute (R-SETI) would offer training for driving taxi/auto-rickshaw, mobile phone repair, beautician, aluminum fabrication, food processing, data entry et al. The drive would cover 630 people. Along with the above mentioned, a financial literacy and credit counseling center have been working in the district. These are to provide preventive counseling on debt management and are free of cost. The financial institutions advanced Rs. 6,910 crore of loans to three priority sectors; agri-based lending stood at Rs. 3,550 crore, followed by Rs. 3,099 crore in services sector, and the MSME sector borrowed Rs. 260 crore worth of loans. The total deposits in the districts were Rs. 38,438 crore and the loan books stood at Rs. 25,505 crore. |