Banking sector occupies a prominent place in the economic development of any nation. The banking sectors not only perform conventional banking activities as deposit and lending functions rather they discharge numerous functions. The new economic policies have brought changes in the economy in various sectors and banking sector is not an exception. It was the situation in rural areas that finding bank branches was rare and the rural people had to move to urban areas for banks. So that, many people in rural areas did not have banking habits. Now the trend has changed over and banks have started their branches irrespective of location. Though there are numerous bank branches are available, in some extent rural people are not account holders or not enjoy the facilities offered by the banking institutions. The study covers various aspects of functioning of banks and also identifies the bottlenecks of growth of banking in rural areas. The study also examines the conditions of banking sector in the liberalization period. The study covers entire villages in Thiruvallur District and 406 samples have been drawn from various villages in Thiruvallur District.
The present study is taken up with the following broad objectives, namely, 1. To find out the level of awareness and to identify the problems in availing banking services among the Customers in rural areas and To analyze the factors motivating to use banking services among the customers in Thiruvallur district, TamilNadu. The results of the study reveals that, the banking services are poor utilized in rural areas due to functional problems associated with non availability and accessibility. The steps taken by the government, in this direction and banks needs to be improve a lot to bring a change in the existing system.
Economic, policies-Social, development-Empowerment-Rural potential- Operational issues
