The meeting reviewed banks’ performance in providing credits to agriculture, micro enterprises and other priority sectors, and under Central and State welfare schemes.

Delivering the key-note address at the 104th SLBC meet Swarnkar, who is also the Chairman and Managing Director(CMD) of Syndicate Bank said that Credit-Deposit ratio as at December 2007 was 78.25 per cent, much above the national average of 71.50 per cent. RRBs exhibited higher ratio of 142.03 per cent in rural areas indicating higher credit flow to agriculture and rural development initiatives.

Agricultural advances in state formed 20.81 per cent of total credit against a national goal of 18 per cent. As against the annual projection of Rs 26,829 crore for 2007-08, banks have disbursed loans upto Rs 20,820 crore by December 2007, he said. Swarnkar appealed to the State Government to release its 50 per cent share of funds towards the interest overdues waived. Reserve Bank of India Regional Director Devaki Muthukrishna said the IT-enabled Financial Inclusion scheme run in the state was worth imitating. Chief Secretary Sudhakar Rao called upon banks to give special attention to the measures for supporting farmers losing crops due to untimely rains and other natural calamities.