NAFCARD held 177^th Board Meeting in Chandigarh on 10^th January 2025 on the invitation of Punjab State Cooperative Agricultural Development Bank Ltd. The Board considered in detail the proposal of NABARD/MOC for restructuring of ARDBs involving merger of viable institutions with the State Cooperative Banks and District Central Cooperative Banks and liquidation of unviable institutions in the structure.

The Board felt that the proposal of NABARD is neither practical nor beneficial to the rural credit system and farmers. These proposals, if implemented will mark the end of the existing channel for Long term finance to farmers, without any alternative arrangements. The merger of ARDBs with SCBs and DCCBs will significantly impact the flow of investment credit as these institutions are not engaged in direct lending to rural sector and depend entirely on PACSs for rural outreach. Merger at State and district level, however does not increase the capacity of PACSs to expand Long term financing in the rural sector. Moreover, with the adoption of model Byelaws and thrust on non-credit businesses PACS are unlikely to take much interest in long term financing to agriculture. The Board also rejected the idea of liquidation of unviable PCARDBs, due to its financial implications on SCARDBs on account of 100% provisioning requirement against their entire loans with PCARDBs. The Board felt that the entire structure in all States would attain sustainable viability within 3 to 5 years with the implementation of reforms recommended by NABCONS study team and urged MOC to take urgent steps in that direction.

The Board, in this meeting also decided to observe International Year of Cooperatives 2025 declared by United Nations under the theme “Cooperatives Build a Better World” and finalized the IYC action plan and calendar of programmes of the Federation.

The meeting was chaired by Shri Dolar Kotecha, Chairman and was also attended by Vice-Chairpersons Shri K. Ravinder Rao (Telangana State Cooperative Apex bank Ltd.), Dr. Moinul Hassan (West Bengal State Cooperative Agriculture & Rural Development Bank Ltd.), Dr. A.R. Shivaram (Karnataka State Cooperative Agriculture & Rural Development Bank Ltd.) and Shri Suresh Kumar Goyal, who is also the Chairman of the host bank), delegates from various other States and Shri K.K. Ravindran, Managing Director.