IIM-A workshop on rural finance

With the considerable debate on rural credit in recent times, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) and Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, (IIM-B) has organised a workshop on 'Rural Finance in Contemporary Times : Interface with Microfinance' at Kasturbhai Lalbhai Management Development Centre (KLMDC) of IIM-A on Friday in assistance with Ratan Tata Fund for Research Collaborations in Microfinance and Microfinance Management Institute, Washington D C.

"While the new government at the centre is putting the focus back on rural India and putting a thrust on increasing access to agricultural credit, there would be increasing pressure on the banking system to extend itself to the agriculture sector in a big way," said N S Sisodia, secretary, banking division, Ministry of Finance, while inaugurating the workshop.

The workshop was co-ordinated by M S Sriram of Centre for Management in Agriculture, IIM-A and R Srinivasan, Dean, Academic and chairperson, Centre for Financial Markets and Institutions- Micro Finance Group IIM-B.

R Srinivasan presented the workshop themes, which included, Dealing with Legacy and Risk, Beyond Agriculture : Is There a Big Market Out There?, Limitations of Microfinance, Publication and Dissemination amongst others, while M S Sriram talked about the trends in the process of rural finance in recent times.

There was a presentation on 'Dealing with Legacy and Risks' by M B N Rao, chairman and managing director, Indian Bank and Vijay Mahajan, MD, BASIX, while V Leeladhar, CMD, UBI and M P Vasimalai of Dhan Foundation talked about 'Beyond Agriculture : Is there a big market.