Chief Secretary, Atal Dulloo, today directed for developing an efficacious grievance portal for the people who face hurdles in availing credit from the financial institutions to start their businesses or for other self employment activities.

The meeting besides the Principal Secretary, Finance was attended by Principal Secretary, Agriculture; Commissioner Secretary, I&C; Secretary, Labour & Employment; Secretary, PWD; Convenor UTLBC; Representatives from Banks and other concerned officers.

Dulloo, while taking cognizance of the Ease of Doing Business in the UT, observed that credit linkage is one of the primary aspects of venturing into any business or establishing a unit. He maintained that any difficulty faced by the potential entrepreneur in availing this credit becomes a stumbling block in advancing his business prospectives. He enjoined upon the financial institutions to make the credit-linkage process less cumbersome so that these aspiring youth can give wings to their aspirations. He directed that a grievance portal inclusive of government machinery and nodal officers from each bank functioning here should be created so that people had a platform to seek timely resolution of their grievances.

He also took note of the saturation of social security schemes like Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY),Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Yojana (PMJJBY), Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY), Atal Pension Yojana and other financial inclusion schemes across the districts of J&K.

He impressed upon the financial institutions to readily extend the benefits of these schemes to the citizens of the UT. He also directed the Finance Department to explore the possibility of linking death records with these accounts so that the death benefits directly accrue to the legal heirs or their nominees immediately after recording of such events.

The Chief Secretary also called for spreading the ambit of these schemes to the uncovered people. He asked the concerned DCs to increase both the number of Rupay Debit Cards and KCC by reaching out to the eligible population. He asked them to employ the IT based interventions to meet the purpose.

He showed his optimism that 30 lakh SHG members could be supported by means of credit linkage. He asked for devising a specific loan product attractive for them besides proportionate increase in the MSME accounts. He advised for inclusion of building construction workers under the Atal Pension Yojana for their ulterior benefit.

Regarding financial inclusion of all and penetration of digital transactions across cross section of the society, he asked for coverage of all the panchayats through Business Correspondents. He also urged them to take advantage of the database build after accomplishing the survey of around 5.5 lakh youth under mission YUVA.

As far as the priority sector lending is concerned, the Chief Secretary emphasised enhanced credit in agriculture sector. He took note of the poor term loan performance and asked for improving the same.

It was given out in the meeting that there are around 24,75,900 PMJDY individual bank accounts, 8,25,500 PMJJBY accounts, 20,13,800 PMSBY accounts and 2,31,500 Atal Pension Yojana accounts registered by the citizens of the UT.

It was further revealed that as part of the previous directions UTLBC is targeting unorganized workers registered on e-Shram portal and members of Self Help Groups (SHGs) for coverage under social security schemes. UTLBC and PFRDA is conducting programmes  throughout the year for LDMs and State Coordinators (Banks) sensitizing them to cover the eligible left out population under the ambit of APY, the meeting was apprised.

As far as digital transactions are concerned, it was added that till December, 2024 the overall coverage of eligible saving bank accounts and eligible business accounts is around 99.80%. Moreover, 1.28 crore eligible accounts are on digital platform leaving a gap of just 25,472 accounts in the UT.