Our Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, while addressing the nation on 15th August 2014, announced and briefed about the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna (PMJDY) which is the biggest financial inclusion initiatives in the world. The main objective of the PMJDY is to bring all the uncovered households of the country under banking channel. While launching the Scheme, the Prime Minister had desCroreibed the occasion as a festival to celebrate the liberation of the poor from a vicious cycle.
The essay is divided in three parts as under:
(1) Features of the scheme and its progress report,
(2) Financial Inclusion: What and why,
(3) Challenges in PMJDY and suggestion for further improvement
1. Features of PMJDY and progress
Jan Dhan Yojna was announced on 15th August 2014. But before announcing the scheme, an extensive home work was done by new government at Centre. Shri Narendra Modi took oath as Prime Minister on 26th May 2014, and immediately thereafter he arranged for a survey, which was conducted in about 2.27 Lac Sub Service Areas (SSAs) in rural areas and wards in urban areas. It was completed in a record time of less than 4 months, as the scheme was launched on 28th August 2014. A separate organization structure has been set up to implement and monitoring the progress of Jan Dhan Scheme under the Finance Ministry and directly being overseeing by Finance Minster Shri Arun Jaitley. At the time of launching the scheme, the target was to cover 7.5 Crore households for account opening. The main features of the scheme are as under:
PMJDY is National Mission for Financial Inclusion to ensure universal access to various financial services like availability of basic savings bank account, access to need based Croreedit, remittances facility, insurance and pension to the excluded sections i.e. weaker sections & low income groups on very low cost.
Account can be opened in any bank branch or in Business Correspondent (Bank Mitra) outlet. Accounts
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