Demonetisation impact: Over 1.2 mn PoS terminals added in 3 months to March

Govt undertook a major drive to promote digital transactions from December onwards

The Finance Ministry on Wednesday said as many as 1.25 million Point of Sale (PoS) terminals were added in January-March this year, giving a boost to the government's efforts to promote digital transactions after demonetisation.

With the addition, the total number of PoS terminals increased to 2.77 million at the end of March 2017.

Further, to improve such infrastructure in villages, 204,000 PoS terminals have been sanctioned from the Financial Inclusion Fund by Nabard, according to key achievements and initiatives of Department of Financial Services for providing social security and credit to various sections of society and ensuring Financial Inclusion.

To augment card-acceptance infrastructure for use of debit cards, a major drive was undertaken between December 2016 and March 2017, resulting in an increase of 1.25 million PoS terminals. This has taken the total number to 2.77 million terminals from 1.52 million as on November 2016, it said.

Various departments under government of India have come out with list of achievements on the third anniversary of the NDA government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Highlighting other achievements of the department, it said, the deposit base under Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) accounts has expanded over time.

As on April 5, the deposit balance in PMJDY accounts was Rs 63,971 crore in 28.23 crore accounts. The average deposit per account has more than doubled from Rs 1,064 in March 2015 to Rs 2,235 in March 2017. A total of 22.14 crore RuPay cards have been issued under PMJDY.

Under Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY) cumulative gross enrolment reported by banks subject to verification of eligibility, etc is about 3.1 crore as on April 12.

A total of 63,291 claims were registered under PMJJBY, of which 59,770 have been disbursed.

As on March 31, a total of 4.85 million subscribers have been enrolled under Atal Pension Yojana with a total pension wealth of Rs 1,756.48 crore.

With regard to Stand Up India Scheme, which facilitates bank loans between Rs 10 lakh and Rs 1 crore to at least one Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe borrower and at least one woman borrower per bank branch for setting up greenfield enterprises, Rs 5,807.7 crore has been sanctioned in 28,444 accounts as on April 11.