Deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi at the event in Patna on Tuesday. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Patna, Feb. 7: Deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi today exhorted banks to provide credit linkage to self-help groups (SHGs) and farmers to boost the state’s economy.

Citing the success stories of SHGs in Andhra Pradesh — where banks have provided Rs 10,000 crore to these groups — Modi said: “If the state has to grow, banks will have to come forward for providing credit facilities to the self-help groups, which have written a well-scripted success story in Andhra Pradesh.”

“It has been witnessed that SHGs have returned their loans to the banks in comparison to individuals. So banks should not dither in giving loans to SHGs,” Modi said.

“We have been witnessing a silent revolution in rural Bihar through these SHGs, which the city people cannot think of. We just need to help them out,” the deputy chief minister said, inaugurating a state-level programme in the state capital for providing credit linkage to SHGs sponsored by Jeevika.

At present, there are 36,577 SHGs in Bihar. Of them, only 20,873 SHGs have bank credit linkage with banks investing about Rs 250 crore in them.

Modi, who also holds the finance portfolio, presented a cheque for Rs 10.26 crore to about 2,000 SHGs. State Bank of India (SBI) came out with a fund of Rs 10.26 crore to provide credit linkage to the women members of the SHGs.

“We have set an ambitious target of constituting about 10 lakh SHGs in the state in the next four years. Around one crore women would be directly associated with the groups that would come in handy in raising the income level of women,” the finance minister said.

Modi also exhorted the banks to provide loans to the farmers through joint liability groups. Under the scheme, there will be five-six landless farmers as members in each group. “They will be each other’s guarantor and submit any document or land deed to get loans,” the deputy chief minister said, adding that the government is also seriously considering to provide facilities to the landless farmers which general farmers get.

The SBI’s Patna circle chief general manager Jeevandas Narayan, general manager Ashish Kumar Ray, Jeevika CEO Arvind Choudhary were present on the occasion.