Bhubaneswar, 1 July (H.S.) Odisha Chief Minister Shri Mohan Charan Majhi held a crucial meeting today at Lok Seva Bhawan with senior representatives of ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, and HDFC Bank, urging them to extend greater credit support to underprivileged beneficiaries through various government welfare schemes.

During the discussion, the Chief Minister emphasized the need for improved participation by these banks in schemes such as Agricultural Loans, the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Programme (PMEGP), PM SVANidhi, Stand Up India, Housing Loans, Education Loans, and Export Financing. He expressed dissatisfaction over the low performance of these banks in the implementation of these schemes across the state.

Highlighting the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister stated that the central government is committed to empowering the poor and marginalized through financial inclusion and self-employment initiatives. He added that active involvement of banks is essential to achieve this goal.

In view of their underwhelming performance, the state government removed ICICI, Axis, and HDFC banks from its empanelled list on June 21, 2025. The Chief Minister reiterated that banks play a vital role in delivering welfare schemes at the grassroots level and should therefore work proactively to enhance credit access for the needy.

He urged the banks to prioritize the disbursal of loans under these schemes to the most economically vulnerable sections of society. In response, the bank representatives assured the Chief Minister of their commitment to improving performance and accelerating loan processing under welfare initiatives.

The meeting also featured a presentation by Shri Shashwat Mishra, Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister, who reviewed the banks' performance in the state.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Monalisa Panda