Financial exclusion

The government and the Reserve Bank of India are trying hard to make financial inclusion a reality but their best efforts are tangled in red tape. Recently, a young man from a scheduled tribe visited a public sector bank in Kota, where he worked, to open an account. Under the Know Your Customer norms, the bank required a document that offered proof of address. Since the only identity document he had was a ration card with the address of his home town, the bank told him to obtain a Rs 100 affidavit from his landlord. The trouble is that in smaller cities landlords neither give rent receipts nor sign rent agreements. And in this case, too, he declined to provide an affidavit. So in the end, the tribal could not open a bank account. If this is what happens in a small town, the situation in rural India can only be imagined.