Awareness and Utilization on Cooperative Banking Services and Schemes in Rural Area

The purpose of this paper is to study the awareness level and utilization of various cooperative banking services in rural area especially Dakshina Kannada district of Karnataka. In India, most of the states are agriculture dominated, especially in rural area, cooperative banks play a key role in bolstering the common individual and financing his self - employment/business and personal needs. The awareness and effective utilization of various rural banking services will improve the financial inclusion statistics of the country. To assess the awareness level, 27 services and schemes offered by the cooperative society are taken and classified into different factors. The awareness levels of rural Muslims are compared with different demographical profile to know the difference. Data was collected through a structured questionnaire and distributed among rural Muslims cooperative bank account holders. The study is descriptive in nature and data was collected from 398 rural Muslims of five taluks of Dakshina Kannada district. To draw meaningful inferences, scales for reliability, normality assumption, Mann Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis test were used to analyze, compare and interpret the data. The results indicate that there are no significant differences among the economic status, income and sub-caste regarding awareness of cooperative banking services and schemes. However, there is a significant difference among the age, residence and occupation regarding awareness of cooperative banking services and schemes.It may help the service provider to implement services and schemes according to the needs and profile of the rural households in the rural area, in order to have effective utilization of services and to raise the standard of living. Practical Implication: The findings of the study will help the various stakeholders to overcome the problem of financial inclusion especially in rural areas and help to provide need-based financial service to the rural households in the country