The present book on "Agriculture and Rural Development", is on prominent subject which was very dear in the heart of Gandhiji. Mahatma Gandhi always dreamed for wiping out the tears from every rural poor, and during his life-time he worked most assiduously for the upliftment of agriculture and rural sectors. He wanted to transform the village economy from its level of subsistence to self sufficient one and for this he emphasised the development of village and cottage industries, to protect not only the indigenous art, skill and ability of the villagers, but also strongly believed that these are the basic industries which have vast potentialities for creating employment opportunities at the grassroot level.

Author has rightly stressed that there is a need for adopting a definite approach to financing of the agriculture and rural sector which would generate surplus, at the local level and which could be fruitfully deployed for creation of jobs at the rural level. The potentialities which exist at the rural need to be harnessed fully and the pyramid of industries should be built up horizontally, as well as vertically, based on the principles of backward and forward linkages, rather than thrusting the high-cost industries from the top which have no relevance to the local potentialities as well as raw material adequacy.

Present book deals will the chapters namely, Introduction; Background Information; Need for Apex Financing Institution (NABARD)-Refinance Approach; Importance of Project Financing Approach in Agriculture and Rural Development; District Approach for Rural Financing-Framework of A Model Plan; Need for Agricultural Development in the Eighth Plan-A Blue Print.

Rural Development is a strategy designed to improve the economic and social life of a specific group of people-the rural poor. From the very dawn of freedom struggle, the socio-economic transformation of the rural masses has been the focal point of all the developmental efforts. Following the political emancipation of the country, a number of experiments under five year plans were initiated to ensure the rural uplift in India. The community Development Programme launched on 2nd October, 1952 was the first step in this direction. It was followed by the Panchayati Raj System introduced in India on October 2, 1959. From the 4th five year plan a number of special area programmes were introduced to change the deserted outlook of the rural scenario. But under these schemes, the gap between the rich and the poor widened to shameful extent. In the light of the growing socio-economic disparities and regional imbalances, the Govt. of India took a fresh look of the whole system of the rural uplift. Hence, a new development programmes called IRDP was launched in India in April 1978. TRYSEM DWERA NREP and RLEGP are the associated sub-schemes of IRDP. But NREP and RLERP were merged into a single scheme called Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY) with effect from April, 1989. The book presents a lucid picture of the impact of IRDP on the rural uplift in J&K State. It highlights the weaknesses of the programme and the author has offered certain suggestions for removing the drawbacks and for making the programme a real success.

This book will be of great use to all those involved in the study of rural development, teachers, scholars, students, administrators, bankers, Govt. and voluntary agencies.

A majority of rural women are from landless agricultural labourers, marginal farmers, artisans and other service castes. Most of these women belong to families below the poverty line and within these families they are most disadvantaged in terms of socio-economic status. The government has recognized the need of upliftment of socio-economic status of women and priority has been given to them in the poverty alleviation programmes such as Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) during different Five Year Plans.

In this book, impact of IRDP on socio-economic status of rural women has been studied elaborately. This study has covered the following aspects:

Importance and an overview of past studies on selected field; Objectives, methodology and profiles of selected District, mandals and Villages; various poverty alleviation programmes with special reference to IRD Programme; socio-economic background of sample beneficiaries; the socio-economic factors, responsible for success of trade; relationship between repayment of loan and socio-economic factors of beneficiaries; impact of success of trade on living conditions, economic dependence and status of respondents; and suggestions and recommendations for further improvement of implementation of the programme.

Regional Rural Banks are one of the financial concepts which have been the outcome of considerable financial experience and experimentation in rural finance and these institutions themselves, nevertheless, have been the objects of much scrutiny, analysis and criticism. Over the period these banks have earned the grudging admiration of the planners while continuing to serve the rural masses/

This book consists of five chapters: Chapter I presents the background of Regional Rural Banks since their establishment, development in the rural banking system, objectives and scope of the study. It is a sort of introduction to the rural banking system in general and Regional Rural Banks in particular. Chapter II reviews the earlier research studies conducted elsewhere to have a better insight into the field of rural banking. Chapter III devotes itself to the description of the study area, the sampling techniques employed, the nature and sources of data and the various tools and techniques used in analyzing the data and evaluating the results. Chapter IV deals with the results and discussion of the study. In addition there are Appendices for supplementing the study.