Head Office Moradabad

PRATHAMA BANK

HEAD OFFICE :: MORADABAD

Prathama Jyoti Scheme ::

Prathama Bank is one of the First Regional Rural Banks of India, established on 2nd October, 1975. The first branch was opened on that day in the hands of Hon’ble Late C. Subramaniyam the then finance minister of Govt. of India and Sri N.D. Tiwari¸the then Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. The Bank is operating in three districtsof western Uttar Pradesh, namely,Moradabad, Rampur & J.P. Nagar. The head quarter of the Bank is situated at Moradabad which is 160 Km away from the National Capital of India,New Delhi. Bank operates through its 191 branches spread over the nook & corner of the three districts.

Topography of the Place::

Moradabad, Rampur & J.P. Nagar districts form the part of western U.P. situated adjoining to Uttranchal state. The forest area of Uttaranchal & Shivalik hills of Himalayas are in the neighbourhood of the command Area. The climate is extreme with temperature going down to near zero in winter and goes as high as upto 45% degree in summer. The atmosphere is dry and mostly two seasons are prevailing in the area.

The Main livelihood ::

Agriculture is the main occupation of the people. Over 80% of the population depend upon agriculture. Sugarcane & Mentha are cultivated as cash crop beside paddy and wheat. In the city of Moradabad¸Industrial & commercial activities are brisk. The place is famous for brass products. The other area comprises of rural & semi urban villages inhabited by farmers, rural artisans, land less laborers.About 40% of the people are below poverty line with literacy level being lowest in the state. These areas mostly are not getting electricity ,even for 12 hours in a day .There are some villages which are in-accessible and electricity is yet to be provided by the Government. Though this area is situated at a distance of 160 Km from the National capital,the vicious circle of poverty and under-development is abundantly visible among this section of the population. The school going children do not get light in the night hours for studies and the villages remain in perpetual darkness even after the 60 years of independence. Their economic deprivation does not permit them to have electricity of their own through Generators or any other means. This area is sensitive from crime point of view.

The social responsibility of the Bank ::

Since Prathama Bank is operating in this part of the country it has taken its role not only as a financial institution but also as a plat form of social & economic development. As electricity is one of the fundamental need of the people in addition to food, dress & shelter, Bank has evolved a new scheme as “Prathama Jyoti” scheme to provide light to economically backward households. Thus Bank has adopted the scheme in the year 2004 to popularise alternative sources for light and power and financed Solar water pumps to strengthen the agricultural production of the farmers in the beginning. New scheme for Solar home light system was introduced for household needs.

SOLAR ENERGY

Prathama Synonym to its name has always played a front runner role for economic upliftment , social awakening and financial literacy of the masses. Prathama Bank has always been a torchbearer in socio-economic upliftment of down trodden sections of the society , may be in form of leading player in the success of Govt. Sponsored Schemes, in micro finance with its innovative Prathama Model, publicizing its schemes and educating villagers through Farmers’ club , eradicating the evil of indebtedness / bonded labour by freeing villagers from the clutches of money lenders , educating villagers about water management,sanitation and cleaning/ clearing village community ponds through its own resources.

Prathama Bank is fully aware of the importance of energy for human life and its development. The prevailing conditions of power supply in its area of operation are below satisfaction. Out of 1536 villages of Moradabad District 358 villages are unelectrified, even electrified villages are for the namesake only as the power supply is erratic in these villages. Moreover the present resources of energy are diminishing fast and the only ray of hope is the renewable resources of energy like solar energy, wind energy, bio energy , tidal energy etc. Solar energy can be the best alternative for transforming the rural life with availability of more 300 clear sunny days in a year, solar energy has a tremendous potential in India.

The Prathama Jyothi scheme ::

1. Purpose :: 2 home light/and/or one fan model for each house hold

2. Cost of Equipment :: Rs.13,500 to Rs.14,500

3. Amount of Loan :: Rs.13,000 to Rs.14,000

4. Rate of Interest :: 9 to 11% (Interest subsidy was initially provided to the

poor villagers of Ishapur, Chandupura & Lalaterkar)

through Bhartiya Vikas Trust/ Swis Dev. Organization

5. Period of Repayment :: 5 to 7 years

6. Repayment schedule :: Annual targets to Sugar cane harvesting

7. Other Bank Charges :: NIL

Bank took assistance of Bhartiya Vikas Trust , an NGO of repute situated at Manipal¸KarnatakaState who organised sensitization programme of Branch Managers.

The Bank felt necessary to acquaint Branch Managers with the utility of the solar home light system so that they may have a faith in the scheme organised and Branch Managers were convinced about the utility of the scheme for rural development and were motivated to persuade the villagers to come forward for solar light. For convincing the rural masses about the utility and economics of the Solar home light systems M/S Satyam Enterprises,a local dealer of M/S. Tata B.P. came forward with Missionary of trust. Mr. Satyaveer Singh proprietor of M/S Satyam Enterprises in collaboration with Prathama Bank organised solar awareness programmes in remotest villages. During these programmes the solar equipments were displayed in villages and also in schools and their working was explained to the rural, a comparative study of economics of present fuel used by them and of solar home light system was explained to them so that they may understand that how it is cheaper to other fuels. Besides this it was also explained to them that how it is eco friendly, pollution free and hygenic whereas other fuels presently used for domestic purpose are the cause of respiratory as well as eye disease. These solar awareness programme which were sponsored by BVT proved to be a milestone in publicity of Solar home light system, till date more than 70 such programme have been organised.

In spite of all these efforts in the initial phase people were hesitant in accepting solar home light system due to higher rate of interest , Prathama Bank recognised this fact and reduced its rate of interest from 11% to 9%p.a. and decided to concentrate on those selected pockets only, which were in dire need of energy and this strategy proved to be successful. Two villages of Dilari block namely Ishapur and Chandupura were identified and bank approached BVT for making SHLs more acceptable to the villagers of these villages, BVT agreed that it will share the burden of inerest upto the extent of 8%p.a. which meant that beneficiaries will have to bear now only 1% rate of interest . M/S Satyam Enterprises also came forward and declared that he will provide subsidy of Rs.1000/- per system financed by Prathama Bank. All these innovative gestures contributed and result was that Ishapur with a population of 50 households got the pride honour of being the first solar village of Uttar Pradesh state.The role of the Bank does not ends here because we have to provide a quality after sales service to the user of solar home light system, here also the Trust came forward and agreed to fund for promotion of a solar entrepreneur equipped with all service tool kit for servicing the systems on call basis for the village.

A function was organised on 22.11.2006 to propagate the message of 100% solar power electrification of Isapur village. Sri G.B.Patnaik,IAS,Principal Seceratary,Govt. of Uttar Pradesh,Lucknow was the Chief Guest, Mr. Pandhari Yadav,D.M., Moradabad on the ocassion announced 04 solar street lights for the village. Thus the houses of Isapur village is not only 100% solar electrified but the street of the village will also be illuminated with solar light. Dr. Veena Joshi, team leader, from Swiss Development organisation visited the village to have first hand feed back on the working status and impact of solar home light system installed and was impressed, the satisfaction on the faces of villagers particularly women and students itself told the story of satisfaction they received. One old lady expressed in local dialact “Is Suraj Ki Lait ne toHum Andho ko Jaise Aankhe de Di Hain” . The whole atmosphere of the village has changed to a happy and prosperous one as compared to the earlier situation of typical, backward and dark village of Uttar Pradesh.

“Students are the future of the nation” and for providing better studying condition to the rural students, PrathamaBank and BVT reached an agreement according to which a student scholarship of Rs. 1000/- will be provided by BVT on SHLs and for this 150 student scholarships were sanctioned out of which 103 students were benefitted by the end of March 2008. For attracting student for adopting SHLs , BVT agreed to instal one solar street light at Janta Rashtriya Inter College Satupura, Distt. Moradabad, the first college identified for promotion of solar home light systems, later on two colleges namely Kisan Upkarak Inter College Bhawalpur and Dayanand Inter college Said Nagli were also covered in the ambit of student scholarship scheme.

For providing wider publicity and acceptability to the scheme, Prathama Bank persuaded BVT to install 06 demonstration units at the houses of rural poors and this was mutually agreed that after one year these units will be installed at other places so that more & more rural population can themselves may feel the utility of the system. A new idea was mooted of providing SHLs to the shopkeepers in SaidNagliVillage and 04 SHLs were installed at shops at subsidized rate of interest,the idea was that these shopkeepers can open their shops for a longer period and can earn more income, this scheme proved to be a success.

A remote village in Moonda Pandey block Lala Teekar , nick named as “Andman Nikobar” of Moradabad District due to its geographical situation , was selected for Solar Home light systems. Reaching this village in rainy season is a herculean task and it was a irony that no Govt. Official or person from Extension/ Development Department took a pain to visit this village .Most of the villagers are uneducated and performs agriculture in traditional manner. Due to unapproachable path, social backwardness resulting in economic backwardness a social stigma was imposed on the villagers of this village and they have to face problems for identifying a suitable match for marrying their children ,A greater dedication was needed for convincing the villagers of this backward village about the utility of solar light and bank staff with a missionary zeal with active involvement of Satyaveer singh rose to the occasion and with in a span of one month only,60 systems were installed in this remotest village with 8%p.a. interest support from the BVT . After Completion of this first phase,the inauguration of this backward solar village was done by Sri G.B. Patnaik special secretary, Governor of Uttar Pradesh on 22nd July2007. Along with other dignitaries Sri Amit Kumar Ghosh,IAS,District Magistrate ,Moradabad graced the occasion and was so much impressed by the committed efforts of Prathama Bank for development of this village, that he announced that a Public Health Centre will be opened in this village. The satisfaction of villagers of this village after installation of SHLs was uttered by a old person when he said that now their children can get a suitable match for marriage.

Besides selection of villages for solar electrification, in 2006-2007, Bank has also selected its 05unelectrified remote area branches to equip with solar power pack Tejas 640. Now these five branches are functioning on solar power.

For better involvement of the Branch Managers, Bank started “Solar Shree” award, this award was given to those branch managers who have financed the maximum number of solar home light systems. Branches were allocated targets for financing 50 SHLs per branch during the year 2007-08. In 2007 one of our Branch Manager of Karanpur branch Sri Rajendra Singh was awarded 2nd prize under SFCBA, a National Award co-sponsored by united states Agency for international Development, Win rock international and Bhartiya Vikas Trust for financing number of solar Home Lighting systems.

Prathama Bank’s pioneering efforts for solar energy paved the way and bank was successful in installing 321 solar home light system during the year 2006-07 and 1258 systems were installed during the financial year 2007-08. During the financial year 2008-09 every rural branches have been allocated target of saturating 2 villages of their area of operation with SHLs. Bank’s motto is to provide light in every hut of its service area so that living standard of the villagers may be improved and our dependence on non renewable resources may be minimised.

Success Story - 1

Ishapur village having 50 families,situated in Dilari Block of Moradabad Distt.

were accustomed of living without light due to unavailability of electricity. Students were helpless and can not study in night due to non availability of light. Even the festival of light Deepawali could not bring a ray of hope in their lives. Keeping all these problems, Bank took an initiative to enlighten the lives of these villagers. Initially a solar awareness programme was organised and villagers were informed about the utility of the solar home light system. 16 families came forward and installed SHLs at their houses, when remaining 34 families themselves saw the illuminating houses of these families they approached our Karanpur branch and requested to finance SHLs. In this way the whole village was saturated with SHLs and this village got the pride honour of being the first

“ Solar Village” of UttarPradeshState.

Sri G.B. Patnaik, IAS, Principal Secretary, Govt. Uttar Pradesh,

Sri Pandhari Yadav, IAS, Distt. Magistrate, Moradabad & Sri. G. C. Mishra,

Chairman, Prathama Bank, Moradabad inaugrauting the 100% SolarVillage,

Ishapur in Moradabad Distt.

Success Story - 2

A remote village in Moonda Pandey block Lala Teekar , nick named as “Andman Nikobar” of Moradabad District due to its geographical situation , was selected for Solar Home light systems. Reaching this village in rainy season is a herculean task and it was a irony that no Govt. Official or person from Extension/ Development Department took a pain to visit this village .Most of the villagers are uneducated and performs agriculture in traditional manner. Due to unapproachable path, social backwardness resulting in economic backwardness a social stigma was imposed on the villagers of this village and they have to face problems for identifying a suitable match for marrying their children ,A greater dedication was needed for convincing the villagers of this backward village about the utility of solar light and bank staff with a missionary zeal with active involvement of Satyaveer singh rose to the occasion and with in a span of one month only,60 systems were installed in this remotest village with 8%p.a. interest support from the BVT After Completion of this first phase,the inauguration of this backward solar village was done by Sri G.B. Patnaik special secretary, Governor of Uttar Pradesh on 22nd July2007.

Sri. G.B. Patnaik, IAS, special secretary, Governor

Uttar Pradesh, Sri Amit Ghosh, IAS, Distt. Magistrate,

Moradabad & Sri G. C. Mishra, Chairman, Prathama Bank,

on the occasion of inauguration at Lala Teekar village.

Along with other dignitaries Sri Amit Kumar Ghosh,IAS,District Magistrate ,Moradabad graced the occasion and was so much impressed by the committed efforts of Prathama Bank for development of this village, that he announced that a Public Health Centre will be opened in this village. The satisfaction of villagers of this village after installation of SHLs was uttered by a old person when he said that now their children can get a suitable match for marriage.