Page 18 - NIS English 16-31 August 2024.pdf

Cover Story
Jan Dhan
Yojana's
Years Vision of the scheme

If we want to get rid of poverty, then we will also
money belonged to the poor, tribal, backward, and have to get rid of financial untouchability. Every
Dalit. In these 10 years, Rs 30 lakh crore has reached person has to be connected to the financial
the bank accounts of beneficiaries directly through system. The poor and deprived should be
connected to the banking system, they should
Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT). Today, India has be freed from the clutches of moneylenders, and
an excellent infrastructure of digital governance. banks should give loans easily, with this vision, one
The poor and middle class of the country have of the world's largest financial inclusion initiatives,
benefited the most from the trinity of Jan Dhan- PMJDY was started.
Mobile and Aadhar i.e. JAM. The convenience and
transparency that has come from this is saving the
money of crores of families in the country.
When the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana was
started, many people were wondering what would
happen, and how it would happen. But today the
experience is that schemes for the poor were
added one after the other. This was the foundation
of economic-social empowerment, which is being
expanded further. In this country, there are several
government pensioners. How much pension did
about 35 lakh people get earlier? Some got seven
rupees, some got 20 rupees, some got one hundred According to the RBI, if the customer has
and twenty-five, and some got two hundred and not made any transaction in the account
fifty. In that too, one had to travel miles to get a for more than 2 years, then the account
pension, but now with DBT, it has been decided should be considered inactive. As a result
that whoever gets a pension will not get less than of various initiatives, the percentage of
one thousand rupees, so that the poor can live with PMJDY inactive accounts, which was 40%
dignity. Prime Minister Narendra Modi says, "You
can imagine, when the banks were nationalized in March 2017, has now come down to half
in 1969, even after 68 years of independence, i.e. about 20%.
68 percent of the people had no participation in The number of women Jan Dhan
the economy. Whereas when a person opens an account holders has increased from
account in the bank, it becomes the first step to 7.5 crores in March 2015 to 28.9 crores
join the mainstream of the economy." in March 2024, that is, in these nine
In the true sense, even after the nationalization years, about 21.40 crore accounts of
of banks in the country decades ago, till the year women have increased.
2014, there were 40-50 crore poor people in the
country who did not even have a bank account.
That is, half the country was out of the banking as a guarantee to the bank. Till 2014, some did
system. Be it ration, house, scholarship, or pension, not even have a bank account. When they did not
the real beneficiaries of many such government have an account in the banks, how would they get
schemes felt cheated. This never became an issue. a loan from the banks? But after opening Jan Dhan
Under this backdrop, Prime Minister Modi made accounts, they were linked to Aadhaar numbers,
Jan Dhan Yojana a movement. More than 52 crore and efforts were made to link as many accounts as
people were connected to the banking system. possible to mobile numbers. Now schemes have
This became the backbone of Digital India and been linked to Jan Dhan accounts. Today money
anti-corruption efforts. Not only this, there was a from more than 425 schemes of the government
time when the poor did not have anything to give is being transferred directly to the bank accounts

16 New India Samachar August 16-31, 2024