NABARD was established on the recommendations of B. Sivaramman Committee, on 12 July 1982 to implement the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development Act It replaced the Agricultural Credit Department (ACD) and Rural Planning and Credit Cell (RPCC) of Reserve Bank of India, and Agricultural Refinance and Development Corporation (ARDC). NABARD has been instrumental in grounding rural, social innovations and social enterprises in the rural hinterlands. It has in the process partnered with about 4000 partner organisations in grounding many of the interventions be it, SHG Bank Linkage programme, tree-based tribal communities' livelihoods initiative, watershed approach in soil and water conservation, increasing crop productivity initiatives through lead crop initiative or dissemination of information flow to agrarian communities through Farmer clubs.