 "#ModiAtMadison: Rs 1,500 crore deposited in banks under Jan Dhan Yojana, says PM")
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said that around Rs 1,500 crore has been deposited so far inbanks under the Jan Dhan Yojana even though people could haveopened new bank accounts with zero balance.
The ambitious ‘Pradhan Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana’launched by the government last month, is aimed at opening atleast one bank account for every family in the country in aperiod of less than six months.
Addressing about 20,000 NRIs at the Madison Square Gardenin New York, the Prime Minister said that about four crore newbank accounts have been opened already under the scheme.He also noted that more than half of the families in thecountry does not have a bank account.
While people could have opened the accounts with zerobalance, they have “deposited Rs 1,500 crore” under thescheme, he said.Modi also said that his Bohra Muslim brothers know whatmoney lenders can do to people. Bohra Muslims are mainly intobusiness.
While launching the scheme on August 28, the PrimeMinister had said it was aimed at eradicating financialuntouchability by providing bank accounts to the poor.On the inaugural day, a record 1.5 crore bank accountswere opened across the country, the largest such exercise on asingle day possibly anywhere in the world.
The scheme would cover 7.5 crore people by January 26,2015, who would be provided zero-balance bank account withRuPay debit card, life insurance cover of Rs 30,000 inaddition to accidental insurance cover of Rs 1 lakh.Later the account holders would be provided an overdraftfacility of up to Rs 5,000.
PTI