Kolkata, 12th December 2024: HDFC Bank, India’s largest private sector bank, under its CSR initiative #Parivartan, has completed five years in the state of West Bengal. During this period, Parivartan has positively reached out to more than 17,000 households.
HDFC Bank Parivartan initiated its interventions in West Bengal back in 2019 with the provision of Scholarships to the underprivileged students. The Bank’s Parivartan programme focuses on five key focus areas of Rural Development, Promotion of Education, Skill Development & Livelihood Enhancement, Healthcare & Hygiene, and Financial Literacy & Inclusion.
HDFC Bank Parivartan’s overall outreach in West Bengal is spread across 11 districts – Purulia, Bankura, South 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas, Murshidabad, Howrah, Jhargram, Birbhum, Bardhaman, Dakshin Dinajpur and Nadia.
Key interventions in West Bengal
Few key interventions spread across different district West Bengal are:
(i) Livelihood enhancement of farmers
Project STREE (Social and Transformative Rural Economic Empowerment), an initiative to empower farmers and rural communities is being implemented across four districts and 17 blocks. Under the project 18 Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) have been institutionalised bringing together over 10,000 women farmers as shareholders. An additional of 24,000 beneficiaries are directly being impacted from interventions like adoption of Good Agricultural Practices, better inputs, crop advisory, sorting, grading, packing and storage for assured market linkage. Five Crop Value Chains are being covered through backward and forward linkages.
66,000 additional farmers are benefitted through other income improvement support under multiple projects across the State.
(ii) Skilling initiative:
Five state of the art skill centres are running in the vicinity of Kolkata to cater to the employment needs of the urban youths. More than 3000 youths are being trained with full placement guidance at reputed companies.
(iii) Natural Resource Management:
Focussed development projects on Natural Resource Management are being implemented in water stressed areas of Bankura, Purulia, Murshidabad, Jhargram and Birbhum. More than 250 Water Harvesting Structures have been created to increase the irrigation command area by 6000+ acres. This is augmenting water storage capacity resulting in additional livelihood scope through aquaculture and livestock farming.
(iv) Rural Development:
Holistic Rural Development project has been implemented in 15 villages of the disaster-prone Sagar island, in the Sundarbans. More than 4000 households have been benefitted through access to renewable energy, smart school infrastructure, clean drinking water, coastal land restoration and so on.
Ms. Nusrat Pathan, Head of CSR at HDFC Bank, said, “At HDFC Bank, we focus on fostering socio-economic development by empowering communities and creating positive change at the grassroots level. We have launched portfolio of projects to achieve these goals in the state of West Bengal. We are committed to driving sustainable development with concentrated efforts on livelihood, education, skill development, natural resource management and community wellbeing.”
“We are dedicated to offering a comprehensive range of banking services throughout the state, ensuring accessibility for all. As a socially responsible corporate citizen, HDFC Bank is equally focused on doing its part to bring about meaningful change in the lives of individuals and families. We remain committed to supporting communities with the resources, training, and guidance they need to thrive,” said Mr. Sandeep Kumar, Branch Banking Head, HDFC Bank.
HDFC Bank was among the top CSR spenders in the country for the financial year ending March 2024. As of 31st March 2024, the Bank spent Rs 945.31 crore on CSR initiatives across the country. The Bank also expanded its impact by reaching more than 10.19 crore beneficiaries cumulatively as of March 2024 in the entire nation.