By Newsgram Staff Writer

In order to promote the growth of the micro businesses and increase employment in the country, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched Micro Units Development and Refinance Agency (Mudra) bank with a corpus of Rs.20,000 crore, on Wednesday.

According to the officials, the step has been taken to encourage 58 million small businesses around the country. Also, 120 million people will be employed including the underprivileged section of the society.

"After 'banking the un-banked' with the Jan Dhan Yojana, it's time to 'fund the unfunded'," said the Prime Minister at the launch event of Mudra.

"Millions of common men and women in this country, who run small businesses, have almost remained outside the net of formal institutional finance, in spite of their large contributions to the economy," Modi added.

"Providing access to institutional finance to such micro and small business units and enterprises will not only help in improving the quality of life of these entrepreneurs, but also turn them into strong instruments of growth and employment generation," said the finance minister Arun Jaitley.

The new norms will help small businesses a fair environment to repay their loans.