NABARD fosters rural prosperity in India

• Stored and managed thousands of paper-based cases each year
• Application approval times were delayed by manual, paper-based tasks
• Paper documents moved from desk-to-desk, risking information loss

Agriculture is a vital component of India’s economy, but production depends on the predictability of monsoon rains for optimal growing conditions.

At the National Bank for Agriculture & Rural Development (NABARD), thousands of employees are striving to mitigate climate-related risks by funding initiatives to protect and promote rural prosperity. NABARD helps local communities and non-governmental organizations secure funding for projects to implement climate-resilient agriculture practices, develop robust and sustainable food value chains, promote agricultural mechanization and more.

Mr. R. Sankar, chief general manager in the department of information technology at NABARD, says, “For the past 40 years, NABARD has been building an empowered and financially inclusive rural India by engaging with all aspects of the rural economy: people, planet and profit. Case management is a key element of our work and we process funding applications for community projects across 400 district offices, 31 regional offices and our head office in Mumbai.”

Assessing and approving cases involves a multi-stage review process that includes several departments across NABARD. In the past, the organization relied heavily on paper to manage cases and process documents. Employees mailed records between head office departments, regional offices and training establishments, increasing the overall time to process cases. Physically moving paper between multiple review and approval teams meant there was an ever-present risk of losing important documents.

Ms. Sujatha Sudhindran, general manager in the department of information technology at NABARD, elaborates, “Handling thousands of hardcopy documents each year consumed significant time, effort and storage space. In a paper-based environment, tracking the status of each case across the review and approval lifecycle was difficult. And with the number of paper records growing by the day, physical document storage and management was becoming increasingly challenging.”

To solve these challenges, NABARD embarked on a digital transformation journey. The aim was to accelerate case and document processing by replacing manual, paper-based tasks with efficient digital workflows. Going paperless also promised to shrink the organization’s own environmental footprint by eliminating the need to print, transport and store paper records.