National Mission for Financial Inclusion to continue, OD limit raised to Rs 10,000

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New Delhi : In a major boost to pro-people and pro-poor initiatives, the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, at its meeting held on September 5, 2018, approved the continuation of National Mission for Financial Inclusion – Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) – beyond August 14, 2018.

The existing Over Draft (OD) limit of Rs 5,000 has been raised to Rs 10,000 and there will not be any conditions attached for OD up to Rs 2,000. The age limit for availing OD facility has been revised from 18-60 years to 18-65 years, according to a PIB release. Under the expanded coverage from “every household to every adult”, accidental insurance cover for new RuPay card holders has been raised from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 2 lakh to new PMJDY accounts opened after August 28, 2018.

The continuation of the Mission would enable all adults/households of the country to have at least a basic bank account with access to other financial services, social security schemes and overdraft up to Rs 10,000.  It will, thus, bring them into the mainstream of financial services and will facilitate transfer of benefits of various subsidy schemes of the Government more efficiently.

About 32.41 crore Jan Dhan accounts have been opened with more than Rs 81,200 crore of deposit balance and 53% women Jan Dhan account holders and 59% Jan Dhan accounts are in rural and semi urban areas. More than 83% operative Jan Dhan accounts (except states of Assam, Meghalaya, J&K) are Aadhaar seeded, with issuance of approx 24.4 crore RuPay cards to these account holders. More than 7.5 crore Jan Dhan accounts receiving DBTs.

A pipeline has been created for the implementation of PMJDY through which Jan Dhan accounts and mobile banking have been linked to Aadhaar (JAM). This pipeline is not only facilitating savings, disbursal of credit, social security, etc. but more importantly channelising direct benefits of various government schemes to poor people of the country through DBT.

It has been decided to continue the flagship financial inclusion programme (PMJDY) with focus on opening accounts from “every household to every adult”. The pipeline of JanDhan-Aadhaar-Mobile (JAM) will continue to provide the necessary backbone for coverage of these activities and thereby accelerating the pace of digitised, financially included and insured society.