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| Electronic benefit transfer for NREGA payments |
| BS Reporter / Kolkata/ Bhubaneswar Sep 23, 2009, 00:56 IST |
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With an aim to achieve financial inclusion and provide door step banking to the rural people, the Orissa government today signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the public sector State Bank of India (SBI) for implementing the electronic benefit transfer (EBT) scheme for National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) beneficiaries.
Shiva Kumar, chief general manager (CGM) of the State Bank of India (SBI) and J P Agarwal, director, Panchayatiraj department of the Orissa government signed the documents in the presence of the Panchayatiraj minister, Prafulla Kumar Samal.
Since the beneficiaries under NREGA were complaining about the delay in getting the payments, the workers were discouraged to work under the scheme. In this context, the EBT is expected to help in increasing the utilisation of funds under the scheme. Orissa is able to utilise about Rs 650 crore per annum under NREGA, compared to about Rs 6000 crore utilised by states like Rajasthan.
As per the agreement, SBI will set up ‘banking outposts’ in all Gram Panchayats of the state in the form of ‘Customer Service Points (CSPs). The Zero Mass Foundation (ZMF) has been roped in as a Business Correspondents (BC) to pay wages under NREGA.
Importantly, Orissa is the first state in the country where all the GPs will be connected by SBI through BC. The bank has selected ‘A Little World’ (ALW) as one of the technology partner for its project in Orissa. ALW is linked with bank’s technology platform and the data transfer is seamless.
The enrolment process of the beneficiaries will be facilitated by the government officials at the Gram Panchayat level to complete the Know Your Customer (KYC) norms prescribed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The photograph and six finger prints will be taken at the time of enrolment and subsequent operations will be based on physical identification and bio-metrics authentication of the beneficiaries.
Speaking on the occasion, S N Tripathy, secretary, Panchayatiraj department said, the Business Correspondent will sit for 4 days in a week and the sitting hours will be flexible. This will create employment opportunities in the rural areas and depending upon the success of the scheme, electronic payments for schemes like Indira Awas Yojana may be adopted.
While Rs 1100 crore will be placed with SBI, the amount may increase to Rs 3000 crore if a similar payment system is introduced for other social schemes, he added.
The Panchayatiraj minister said, the main intention of the scheme was to prevent migration. Earlier the payment used to take about a month, discouraging the workers to join the scheme. As a result, out of 52 lakh beneficiaries registered for work under NREGA, only 14 lakh workers worked for an average of 40 days during the year, he added.
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