Nabard extends Rs 970 cr financial support to J&K in FY15

Patting Jammu and Kahsmir for "better implementation" of schemes, Nabard said it extended a financial assistance of Rs 970 crore to the state during FY 2014-15 for the development of infrastructure, agriculture and allied sectors.
"During the financial year 2014-15, the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development's (Nabard) support in the state of Jammu and Kashmir reached a new peak of Rs 970 crore by way of refinance to banks, Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) assistance and grant assistance to banks, NGOs, KVKs and SKUAST," Shankar A Pande, Chief General Manager, Nabard (J&K), told reporters here today.
Lauding Jammu and Kashmir for better performance despite the floods last year, Pande said, "J&K is doing better than many other state in the country as far implementation of the schemes in concerned".

Of Rs 970 crore, Nabard extended aggregate refinance support of Rs 602.12 crore to commercial banks and Regional Rural Banks (RRBs) in the state, he said.
This includes long-term refinance support of Rs 503.62 crore to these banks for financing agriculture and rural enterprises for creation of productive assets for sustainable growth, he said.
Apart from this, Pande said, "Nabard also extended financial support of Rs 98.50 crore to Regional Rural Banks (JKGB and EDB) for extending crop loans through KCC to farmers."

In order to increase the credit flow in agriculture sector, Nabard also launched Area Development Schemes (ADS) in five districts namely Jammu, Kathua, Samba, Rajouri, & Dodaunder which various banks are expected to finance dairy development activities.

Under Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF), Nabard has released loan assistance of Rs 366 crore to the state government during 2014-15 for rural infrastructure projects, surpassing previous year's disbursement of Rs 277 crore (32 per cent increase), in spite of the long spell of natural calamity witnessed during the year, which affected the pace of project execution, he said.
Nabard sanctioned 115 new projects pertaining to roads and bridges (62), rural market yard (1), seed farms (3), animal and sheep husbandry (33) and primary health centres (16) involving RIDF loan of Rs 307.91 crore to the state under RIDF Tranche XX in 2014-15.

"This was 7 times higher than the aggregate project sanctioned for Rs 40.28 crore during 2013-14," he said.
Cumulatively, as on 31 March 2015, Nabard has sanctioned 4,837 infrastructure projects under RIDF involving Nabard support of Rs 4,702 crore and disbursed Rs 4,030.35 crore to government of Jammu & Kashmir, he said.