Data on sectoral deployment of bank credit collected from select 33 scheduled commercial banks, accounting for about 90 per cent of the total non-food credit deployed by all scheduled commercial banks, for the month of October 2021, are set out in Statements I and II.

On a year-on-year (y-o-y) basis, non-food bank credit¹ growth accelerated to 6.9 per cent in October 2021 as compared to 5.2 per cent in October 2020.

Highlights of the sectoral deployment of bank credit are given below:

• Credit to agriculture and allied activities continued to perform well, registering an accelerated growth of 10.2 per cent in October 2021 as compared to 7.2 per cent in October 2020.

• Credit growth to industry picked up to 4.1 per cent in October 2021 from a contraction of 0.7 per cent in October 2020. Size-wise, credit to medium industries registered a robust growth of 48.6 per cent in October 2021 as compared to 20.8 per cent last year. Credit to micro and small industries accelerated to 11.9 per cent in October 2021 from 0.7 per cent a year ago. Credit growth to large industries stood at 0.5 per cent in October 2021 as compared to a contraction of 1.8 per cent a year ago.

• Within industry, credit growth to ‘all engineering’, ‘chemicals & chemical products’, ‘food processing’, ‘gems & jewellery’, ‘infrastructure’, ‘mining & quarrying’, ‘rubber, plastic & their products’ and ‘textiles’ accelerated in October 2021 as compared to the corresponding month of the previous year. However, credit growth to ‘basic metal & metal products’, ‘beverage & tobacco’, ‘cement & cement products’, ‘construction’, ‘glass & glassware’, ‘leather & leather products’, ‘paper & paper products’, ‘petroleum, coal products & nuclear fuels’, ‘vehicles, vehicles parts & transport equipment’ and ‘wood & wood products’ decelerated/contracted.

• Slowdown in credit growth of services continued, as it decelerated to 2.9. per cent in October 2021 from 8.6 per cent a year ago.

• Personal loans continued to grow at a robust rate of 11.7 per cent in October 2021 vis-a-vis 8.7 per cent in October 2020 primarily due to ‘housing’, ‘vehicle loans’ and ‘loans against gold jewellery’.

Ajit Prasad          
Director (Communications)

Press Release: 2021-2022/1281

¹ Non-food credit data are based on Section - 42 return, which covers all scheduled commercial banks (SCBs).