Deputy Commissioner V.P. Ikkeri has said that the district has achieved 100 per cent coverage under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY).
Since its launch on August 16, 2014, as many as 1,90,154 zero-balance bank accounts had been opened in the district.
With this, all the 4,08,171 households in the district have a bank account each, and thereby, total financial inclusion has been achieved, he said at a press conference here on Thursday.
A survey was conducted in the limits of 260 gram panchayats and 189 wards of urban local bodies to find out the families that didn't have access to banking facilities. From the fourth week of August, a number of camps were organised by all the 16 nationalised banks in the district to get zero-balance accounts opened by such families, he said.
Mr. Ikkeri said that a few families of migrant labourers might have been left out. The district Lead Bank would conduct a special drive shortly to identify such families and bring them under the PMJDY, he said.
The process of distribution of ‘RuPay’ debit cards for the beneficiaries of PMJDY had commenced.
So far, 65,000 such cards had been distributed. According to the new guidelines, it was mandatory to record at least two transactions through RuPay card prior to the day of accident to claim the Rs. 1-lakh accident insurance, he said.
The PMJDY, the flag-ship scheme of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was a significant step in financial empowerment of poor families. The first phase of the scheme in which it had been planned to open bank accounts for all households had been successfully completed in Shivamogga district.
In the second phase, a campaign would be launched to create financial awareness among the account-holders. The banks through the Financial Literacy Centres at taluk-level would create awareness among people on banking transactions and the guidelines of PMJDY, he said.
Addressing the gathering, district manager of the Lead Bank R.R. Patil said, to avoid misuse of overdraft facility and the insurance benefits offered under PMJDY by opening multiple accounts, the process of linking bank accounts with Aadhar cards of account-holders had been taken up. H. Shivaram, Assistant General Manager of Canara Bank; M.S. Raghavendra, Assistant General Manager of National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development; and G. Himantharaju, Assistant Director of Department of Information were present.
Survey conducted to find out families still remaining out of the programme
Lead Bank to launch special drive to bring them under the total financial inclusion scheme
