Plan to bring banks to Punjab, Haryana villages by March

Punjab has just 275 villages yet to have a bank, while Haryana has 144

If everything goes well, there will be no unbanked village in Punjab and Haryana by next month-end. The mission is to provide banking services to every village in both states -- under a financial inclusion plan by the end of the ongoing financial year.

According to data by SLBC (state-level banker’s committee), banking services have been provided to 1,301 of Punjab’s total 1,576 unbanked villages. As for neighbouring Haryana, 1,694 of its 1,838 unbanked villages have been provided with the service.

Overall, Punjab has 275 villages that are yet to brought under banking ambit, while the corresponding figure in Haryana is 144.

An SLBC meet on Wednesday was told that banks were in the process of implementing a financial inclusion plan to provide banking outlets/services in the unbanked villages having a population of over 2,000.

The move comes in tune with the recommendations of a high-level committee to review lead bank scheme. It is chaired by Usha Thorat, deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India.

SLBC chairperson Usha Ananthasubramanian, while delivering the keynote address here on “Inclusive growth through Financial Inclusion Plan”, said such unbanked villages in Punjab and Haryana have been allocated the facility on the basis of a service area approach.

She urged upon the member banks to cover the remaining villages by next month — in both Punjab and Haryana.

To facilitate the banks in achieving the target of financial inclusion, Ananthasubramaniam, who is executive director of Punjab National Bank, also referred to the direction of the department of financial services under the union ministry of finance.

It asked the banks to open a brick-and-mortar branch if the population of a village in an under-banked district is more than 5,000, and if the population of such a district was 10,000 and above.

In districts where such a conventional brick-and-mortar branch was not viable, a bank may set up ultra-small branches, it added.

The SLBC chief also requested the lead district manager of the banks to prepare a plan of all unbanked villages with a population of less than 1,000, and consider allocating them to different banks across all villages across Punjab.