'Bengal has lowest NPA in India'

Kolkata: The Secretary of Panchayats and Rural Development Department Choten Lama on Saturday stated that Bengal has the lowest NPA in the country in the Self Help Group (SHG) portfolio, which is less than 2 per cent.

"Our government under 'Anandadhara' — West Bengal State Rural Livelihoods Mission is promoting many poverty eradication initiatives in the rural areas through various women empowerment schemes and the SHGs form the basic unit for this economic mobilisation," Lama opined, speaking at an interactive session organised by ICC.

The schemes under 'Anandadhara' are primarily aimed at community managed sustainable agricultural initiatives with active participation of the local Panchayats. The state has over 5,000 women 'Prani Mitras' to support social inclusion and social development projects through livelihood missions. The state also has around eight lakh SHGs with capacity building being a prime objective of the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM.)

According to Lama who is also the Mission Director and CEO of the West Bengal State Rural Livelihood Mission, the state government has allocated a vulnerability fund of one lakh rupees each for all the Gram Panchayats to assist economically marginalised and vulnerable people with sustainable livelihood opportunities.

This fund will be of great help to support a poor family if somebody in the family associated with the SHG suddenly expires.

Bengal, till now, has trained over 3,000 women as Community Service Provider-Bank Linkage (CSP-BL) to assist rural women entrepreneurs with compliance for institutionalised finance.