Jan Dhan Yojna: Public sector lenders outshine private banks

Prime Minister Narendra Modi 

WHEN Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the ambitious Jan Dhan Yojna, the financial inclusion scheme on August 28, 2014, the focus was on the public sector lenders and now after about four months, the private sector banks are way behind their PSU peers in so far as opening financial inclusion accounts.

The public sector banks have...
opened 8.62 crore such accounts in the same period. The number of such accounts opened by even regional rural banks stands at 1.92 crore.

The private banks with a market share of about 20 percent have only about three percent contribution in this flagship financial inclusion programme.

As per the latest finance ministry data, 13 private sector banks have opened 30.47 lakh Jan Dhan bank accounts as against 8.62 crore by state-owned banks as on January 7.

The initial target was to open 7.5 crore such accounts, but the later it was revised upwards to 10 crore to be completed by January 26, 2015. However, this target has already been achieved.

Taking into account the regional rural banks, so far a total of 10.84 crore Jan Dhan accounts have been opened so far by all banks in the country.

As far as public sector banks are concerned, they have opened more than 8.62 crore Jan Dhan accounts. Country's largest bank SBI has opened 2.15 crore accounts, followed by Punjab National Bank (61.74 lakh), Bank of Baroda (58.47 lakh), and Canara Bank (53.79 lakh).

The main features of the PMJDY scheme include Rs 5,000 overdraft facility for Aadhaar-linked accounts, RuPay Debit Card with inbuilt Rs 1 lakh accident insurance cover.

Among private banks, just three of them -- HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and J&K Bank -- account for about two-third of total accounts opened by private sector lenders.

HDFC Bank has opened 7.8 lakh such accounts, followed by ICICI Bank's 6.67 lakh and Jammu and Kashmir Bank's 6.06 lakh.

Axis Bank has opened 2.45 lakh accounts and Kotak Mahindra Bank has opened just 54,000 accounts.

Besides, account holders under the scheme will get life insurance cover of Rs 30,000. This was additional benefit announced by the Prime Minister during the launch of the scheme.