NEW DELHI: India’s poverty reduction scheme offering banking services to underprivileged people has covered 530 million adults in 10 years, the Indian Ministry of Finance has announced.

Called the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, it is the ‘largest financial inclusion initiative in the world,’ the Ministry said as the scheme marked its 10th anniversary on Wednesday.

Marking the anniversary, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, ‘Jan Dhan Yojana is about dignity, empowerment and opportunity.’

He said 295 million of the scheme’s beneficiaries are women with low income. The scheme ensures financial empowerment of women and eliminates middlemen by directly transferring benefits due to ordinary people by crediting them into Jan Dhan accounts. Jan Dhan in Hindi language means people’s wealth.

In an anniversary message, India’s Finance Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, said, ‘universal and affordable access to formal banking services is essential for achieving financial inclusion and empowerment of the people. I
t integrates the poor into the economic mainstream and plays a crucial role in the development of marginalised communities.’

There are no account opening fees or maintenance charges for Jan Dhan accounts and no requirement to maintain a minimum balance. In the last decade, 67 percent of such accounts have been opened in rural areas where there were millions of unbanked Indians.

Account-holders are also provided ?200,000 (about US$2,450) in accident insurance cover.

The Bank for International Settlements in Switzerland, owned by Central Banks from across the world, said in a study on Jan Dhan Yojana that without this pioneering scheme, it would have taken India 47 years to cover 80 percent of unbanked adults in the country.

Source: Emirates News Agency