Friday, August 26 2005 18:23 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The National Advisory Council (NAC) headed by UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi today (Aug 26, 2005) favoured reforms in the rural credit cooperative system and a bill on the rehabilitation of families affected by projects.

The NAC, set up to monitor implementation of the UPA government's Common Minimum Programme (CMP), at its 16th meeting underscored the need to pay special attention to expand institutional credit in the North East where community ownership of land is common.

The meeting, attended by Gandhi and nine other members, discussed the revival of rural cooperative credit institutions in the context of commitment in the CMP to double the flow of rural credit in three years and to substantially expand the coverage of small and marginal farmers by institutional lending, an official spokesman said.

The report of the Task Force on the revival of the Rural Cooperative Credit Institutions (Vaidyanathan Committee) was discussed and it was agreed that the NAC would forward recommendations to the Government supporting the reform package suggested by the Task Force.

The spokesman said attention would be drawn to inbuilt guarantees to increase coverage for small and marginal farmers and for integrating the requirements of women self-help groups in various parts of the country.

The centrality of the legal and institutional reforms would be emphasised, he said. The Council discussed the issue pertaining to a new National Policy for Resettlement and Rehabilitation of project-affected families.

"It was agreed that these would be studied further to facilitate the consideration of a composite Land Acquisition and Rehabilitation Bill accompanied by effective monitoring mechanism", the spokesman said.

During the discussions on technical, social and market issues in respect of regeneration of wastelands, he said it was noted that these related to regeneration of different types of wastelands and covered agro-forestry, farm-forestry and industrial plantation.

Observing that most of the problems were cross-sectoral and changes were needed with regard to functioning of field machinery at Central and state levels, the NAC decided that it would take up specific action points with the government with a view to providing sharper and urgent focus to the implementation of wasteland development programmes.

It was also necessary to introduce technologies, which are now available to various scientific organisations in the country, the spokesman added.