Finance Minister Holds Meeting With Heads Of Banks

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman held a meeting with heads of public sector banks and financial institutions in the capital Delhi on Tuesday. During this, he also reviewed the performance of loans and other welfare schemes for scheduled castes. Schemes like Stand-up India, Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana (PMMY), and Credit Growth Guarantee Scheme for Scheduled Castes (SC) and their progress were also discussed during the meeting.

During the review meeting, the Finance Minister directed the banks to fill up a small number of remaining backlog vacancies in a time-bound manner. He also advised the banks to increase the coverage of Scheduled Castes in all the schemes and also the heads of the public sector banks to look into their needs for capacity building, and entrepreneurship development. He said that banks should maintain proper digital records for the jobs being outsourced. Especially from October 1, the record of recruitment for posts like Safai Karamcharis. He also said that redressal of all pending grievances related to the SC community can also be done in a special drive by DFS from 2nd October.

The Finance Minister also said that necessary reforms to be done in all schemes like CEGSSC, and VCF can be taken up by DFS after discussions with agencies like the Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DICCI). DICCI is working with the Scheduled Castes at the grassroots level.

The review meeting was attended by National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) Chairman Vijay Sampla, members NCSC, Subhash Ramnath Pardhi and Dr. Anju Bala, Union Minister of State for Finance Dr. Bhagwat Kisanrao Karad, and Department of Financial Services (DFS) Secretary Sanjay Malhotra besides DFS and NCSC. Senior officials were also present.