25 per cent of Jan Dhan accounts opened in Odisha have zero balance : REPORT

BHUBANESWAR: About 97 lakh new bank accounts have been opened in Odisha under the Jan Dhan Yojana as of August 10. A fourth of these had zero balance, or no transactions. "Also, 25% of these new account holders are yet to receive their passbooks," Pradip Kumar Amat, Odisha's minister of finance and public enterprises said on Friday while addressing a state-level meet of
bankers. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana is the Narendra Modi government's flagship financial inclusion scheme. According to the scheme's official website, as of August 10, 23.62 crore accounts had been opened across the country, 14.49 crore of these in rural India. While the funds in these accounts totalled Rs 41,723.3 crore, 24.31% (a figure very close to Odisha's) of the accounts were zero balance accounts. Amat pointed out that 80% of Odisha's gram panchayats do not have a branch. Despite efforts to extend bank services through banking or business correspondents and other ideas such as Banks on Wheels and Micro ATMs, rural areas remain underserved, he said.

The minister also pointed to the "worrying" low figures of Aadhar seeding. "Although Aadhar enrolment has been done for 91% of the eligible people in the state, Aadhar seeding has been done only for 35% of the bank account holders. Banks may conduct Aadhar seeding in 'camp mode' in coordination with concerned government departments," he said.

Odisha is going to set up a Direct Benefit Transfer Cell, he said.

The minister also pointed to another important concern for the agriculture sector for which Odisha reserves a separate budget. Banks had achieved only 85% of their crop loan targets for 2015-16 and 50% of the targets under agriculture term loans.

This fiscal, banks met only 21% of crop loan and 14% per cent of term loan targets in the first quarter.

As per a recent report of agriculture department, commercial banks have for the past six years fallen way short of the targets. Only Rs 3,823 crore was dispersed for crop loans against a target of Rs 8,315 crore in 2014-15, for example. Cooperative banks, which provide 70% of agriculture loans in the state, fared better, actually exceeding their targets for 2014-15, according to the report. 

25 per cent of Jan Dhan accounts opened in Odisha have zero balance: State finance minister Pradip Kumar Amat