Niket Shukla discuss about the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna, benefit and problems of the scheme.
Exclusion of large section of society from any kind of accesses to financial services hinders the growth of a country. Financial inclusion of people of a country is a crucial step towards poverty reduction. In India also a scheme to empower people financially was highly required so that everyone can take the advantage of growth and development of the country.
Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojna is an initiative launched under the financial inclusion scheme by the current government under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to provide easy access to financial services like insurance, credit, savings and deposit accounts in banks to poor and lower section of the society. This scheme was officially launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 15th Aug 2015. On the occasion of launching this scheme the PM stated it as a festival to celebrate liberation of the poor from a vicious cycle.The main intention behind launching this scheme is to ensure an easy financial access to people at country level. The programme is aimed particularly to benefit those people who were unable to receive the benefits of different other financial inclusion schemes launched by government in past years. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna entered Guinness book of world records as more than 10 crore new bank accounts were opened under this scheme. More than 1, 80, 96,130 bank accounts were opened by people on the first week of this scheme.
Under Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna, anyone who has attained the age of 10 years and is not having a bank account can open it under his/her name without depositing a single rupee.This scheme is available only in banks and other business correspondent outlets which provide bank accounts, selected by the government. There are numerous private and public sector banks that provide the PMJDY (Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna)scheme.Under this programme opening a person’s dream of having a bank account in his name has became true. The process of opening a bank account has been made very easy.
Benefits Of Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojna
This scheme was launched at an enormous scale to bring under the ambit of banking all citizens of the nation; irrespective of their financial status or regional location. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna got an overwhelming response from the customers from both rural as well as urban areas. The scheme basically aims at revolutionizing the way banking is done in our country and it also aims at helping the economically backward section of the society. Apart from providing benefit to common people, the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna would is also benefitting the overall economy of the country. Main benefits available under this scheme are-
- Insurance benefit– The bank account holders of Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna scheme can take the benefit of insurance like accidental life cover and life cover benefits.The scheme enables the account holders to enjoy life accidental life insurance coverage of Rs. 100000 and life insurance coverage worth Rs. 30000.
- Mobile banking benefit with Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna– Banking through mobile is not a new invention anymore. Numerous public as well as private banks offer mobile banking facilities to customers. Keeping the economic status of people who are below poverty line, this scheme aims to make available certain basic financial transactions not only through smart phones but also through ordinary mobile.
Major Concerns regarding Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna Scheme
In terms of ambit and size, Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna is an outstanding scheme perchance among all financial inclusion schemes underway in other parts of the world. An estimated more than 19 crore of the total accounts opened under this scheme have been issued Rupay cards which can be used like any other debit card to withdraw money from ATMs.
Banks situated in India have their code of customer rights developed by standards board of India and Banking codes, to assure protection of customers, promote confidence in the banking system and foster fair banking practices.The matter of concern here is the bank officials are themselves putting money(even if it is a rupee) into Jan Dhan accounts without the knowledge of account holders with an intention to boost numbers of non-zero balance accounts violates the code. The matter of greater concern is the potential misuse of jan dhan accounts, the fact that anyone can deposit in your account and later anyone can say that this was bribe funds. Using someone’s account who isn’t aware of the basic banking facilities can be a good way to convert black money into white money.
