I started this blog late last year but hadn't been putting up posts regularly for long. I have savings accounts that I don't use regularly. Why I am saying all this? For some reason, when I heard that most of the new bank accounts opened in the countryside under government's financial inclusion efforts are showing no financial activity, I only got reminded about myself. But there is an important difference. I can do something about it while people in the countryside can't. You need to be getting payments that will move into the banks. That isn't happening. During my interactions various chief executives of banks in the last one year I have realised that they are waiting for government payments such as that of MNREGA and pensions to make this effort worth the bother. That in turn depends on the implementation of the Unique Identification Number project or the Aadhar scheme. Once this unique number is given to a large number of Indians, payments will be made using this number as the reference. The FM mentioned that the scheme is ready for implementation in his Union Budget speech recently. I got my formalities for Aadhar months back but have little idea where and how the closure of the process will happen with a card or the number coming in. There is a lot riding on Aadhar be it rifle-shooting for subsidies to stop leakage or making the bank accounts in rural areas work. If successful it will become a role model for many countries. Till then, for banks, it will be more of following the diktats of RBI and the government.
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