Correspondence to: Abdulaziz K, Department of Agricultural Economics, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, India, Tel: +918607345157; E-mail: kabeerabdulazeez@yahoo.co.uk 225 Journal of Economics, Business and Market Research (JEBMR) 2020 SciTech Central Inc., USA Vol. 2(1) 225-233 00 CONTRIBUTION OF LENDING INSTITUTIONS IN THE GROWTH OF INDIAN AGRICULTURE Kabir Abdulaziz * Department of Agricultural Economics, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, India K K Kundu Department of Agricultural Economics, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, India D P Malik Department of Agricultural Economics, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, India Received 24 September 2020; Revised 06 October 2020; Accepted 05 January 2021 ABSTRACT The study examined the role of lending institutions in the development of Indian agriculture. Data for the study was obtained from secondary sources obtained from published articles, annual reports of RBI, NABARD, publications of Central Government Offices etc. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics such as percentages, frequencies and compound annual growth rate (CAGR). The results reveal that in the early years particularly during the pre-green revolution era, agricultural credit was dominated by non-institutional sources, mainly moneylenders who are known to extort the farmers by charging exorbitant interest rates. However, the turn of the post liberalization era witnessed a paradigm shift with the institutionalization of agricultural credit in India. This has led to a remarkable success in terms of agricultural credit provision with the institutional sources of credit performing a leading role in agricultural credit delivery to farming households. Recently, institutional credit sector has performed astonishingly by surpassing its annual targets with few exceptions from 2011-12 to 2018-19. Furthermore, the results indicate that the commercial banking sector has controlled its counterparts in agricultural credit disbursement in rural areas as pictured by both CAGR and achieved credit targets of the institutions. Keywords: Indian agriculture, Commercial banking sector, Lending institutions, Agricultural credit. INTRODUCTION Credit is arguably the most important input for conducting all agricultural development programmes as it enables farmers to make new investments as well adopt recent technologies that will ensure increased production and productivity of their farming enterprise(s). The importance of agricultural credit is further reinforced by the unique role of Indian agriculture in the macroeconomic framework along with its significant role in poverty alleviation (Kumar, et. al. 2010). Credit refers to certain amount of money provided for certain purpose on certain conditions with some