The House May Confirm the Circulated Minutes

The 141st meeting of State Level Bankers’ Committee (Punjab) to review the performance of banks for the period ended June 2017 will be held on 10.08.2017 at 10.30 A.M. at Hotel Shivalik View, Sector 17, Chandigarh. The following issues shall be taken up for discussion in the meeting:-

Item No.1 / Confirmation of minutes of 140th meeting of State Level Bankers' Committee (Punjab)
Last Meeting of SLBC / Held on 30.05.2017
Minutes e-mailed/ circulated on / 12.06.2017
Comments Received / NIL

The House may confirm the circulated minutes.

Item No. 2 / Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana.
Item No. 2(i) / Issuance of Rupay Cards and its Activation in PMJDY accounts.

Activation of Rupay Debit Cards is necessary to get the insurance claim under the Rupay Card. All Rupay Card holders (valid for Physical or Virtual RuPay card holder) i.e Cards issued on an IIN assigned by RuPay are eligible for the benefit under the RuPay Insurance Program.

The eligibility to claim accidental cover is as under:-

Ø  Benefits of Insurance will be available to the Card holders who have performed minimum one successful financial ornon-financialtransaction at any Channel both Intra andInter-banki.e.on-usandoff-us.

Ø  Transaction must be conducted within 45 days prior to date of accident including accident date for Premium Card holders and within 90 days prior to date of accident including accident date for Non Premium Card holders.

Ø  All customer induced transactions at Branch will now be included as eligible transactions under the Rupay Insurance Program.

The position of issuance of Rupay Cards is as under:-

No. of PMJDY Accounts / No. of Rupay cards issued / No. of Rupay Cards not issued / No. of Rupay cards actiated / No. of Rupay cards not actiated
6097988 / 5102821 / 995167 / 3226490 / 1876331

(The bank-wise position is as per Annexure-1 (Page 90-94)

Member banks are requested to utilize the services of FLC Counselors and Bank Mitras for creating awareness amongst the customers about the above guidelines so that no person is deprived of the benefit of insurance claim of Rupay cards.

Item No. 2(ii) / Monitoring of Zero Balance Accounts- in PMJDY

Out of total 6097988 accounts opened, 902109 accounts (14.79%) still show zero balance. During the deliberations in the 140th meeting of SLBC held on 30.05.2017, the progress of Zero balance accounts was reviewed and member banks were requested to take steps for reduction in accounts having Zero balance. It was suggested that the Bank Mitras

can be very helpful in bringing the number of Zero Balance accounts. Member banks were requested to take the services of Bank Mitras for bringing down the zero balance accounts.

Period / Total PMJDY Accounts / Zero Balance accounts / %age of zero balance accounts
30.06.2017 / 6097988 / 902109 / 14.79
31.03.2017 / 5714878 / 942474 / 16.49
Increase/Decrease / + 383110 / - 40365 / -1.70

Bank wise position in zero balance account is as per Annexure-2 (Page 95).

The house may deliberate.

Item No. 3 / Seeding of Aadhaar and Mobile in Savings bank accounts.

Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Finance, Government of India vide communication dated 06.03.2017 have informed that with a view to enable account holders for digital payments, banks have been asked to launch a drive in campaign mode in July 2017 for seeding of Aadhaar number in all operative, individual savings bank account and voluntary seeding of Aadhaar number in all such accounts.

Department of Institutional Finance and Banking has already informed all the Deputy Commissioners in the State of Punjab that, Government of India has desired to organize camps where banks would ensure arrangements for on-the-spot seeding after wide publicity and accountholder-specific outreach efforts. For other areas, account holder specific outreach efforts should be made through branch personnel and by mobilizing and incentivizing BCs and, additionally, through innovative strategies to enlist other agencies.

Department of Institutional Finance and Banking has further requested Deputy Commissioners to provide requisite support of the district administration and field functionaries be provided for organizing the camps, reaching out to unseeded accountholders and ensure effective publicity.

The progress as on 30.06.17 as informed by MOF is as under:-

(in lacs)

No. of active Saving Accounts / Seeding with Aadhaar
Number / %age
260.02 / 213 / 81.90%

Member banks are requested to take steps for maximizing the Aadhaar seeding in active saving fund accounts.

Item No. 3(i) / Aadhaar Lookup –Facility.

National Automated Clearing House (NACH), has introduced Aadhaar lookup-facility for the benefit of banks. This facility would allow the banks to know the status of AADHAAR mapping in the NACH System and can be used for verification of the list of Aadhaar numbers through an upload process and response thereof. This would help the banks to process Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) transactions more efficiently and help reduce returns.

This facility would be available for banks from 1.30 PM to 5.00 PM on daily basis form Monday to Friday and 1.00 PM to 2.30 PM on Saturday. For any queries/help banks can take up through e-mail at . Convener bank has already e-mailed the procedure vide e-mail dated 14.06.2017.

Member banks are requested to use this facility for effective implementation of all the schemes of Govt. of India.

Item No. 4 / Debt-Waiver announced to farmers in the Govt. of Punjab.

Government of Punjab has recently made an announcement in Vidhan Sabha regarding Debt- Waiver for Small and marginal farmer’s upto Rs.2 lakhs. As a result the farmers in the state of Punjab have stopped making repayment of their crop loans and the recovery scenario is being adversely affected. Even other farmers are not making repayments in the hope of Debt waiver.

However since no official communication has been made to the banks, they are also not in a position to clearly guide the farmers. Although the formal notification in this regard is yet to be issued by the state government, it is requested that state government should clarify the following points to the bankers:-

i.  Eligibility criteria for providing Debt Relief to the farmers.

ii.  Cut off date for calculating the outstanding amount.

iii.  Indicative date for final payment to the banks.

The representative of the State Government is requested to deliberate and appraise the latest position in the matter.

Item No. 4(i) / Web-Portal for submission of on line SLBC data .

The convener bank proposes to develop a Web-Portal for ON LINE submission of data which will ensure its hassle free submission and while entering the data for the relevany period, the user will be able to view and compare the data with the previous quarter, thereby eliminating the chances of errors.

Besides providing User manual, the SLBC would arrange for suitable training of the concerned officials.

In this system user Id and password will be issued to each user Bank/LDM/Department and data will have to be submitted online. Thus no hard copes would be submitted and the portal will help in quick transmission/flow of data and its meaningful compilation and interpretation. After submission, the data can be amended only with the permission of the administrator (SLBC).

The house may deliberate and approve.

Item No. 5 / Appointment of Bank Mitras, Verification Calls by State Call Centers/ SLBC/ LDMs to Bank Mitras & providing Micro ATMs to them.

For universal access to banking facility and to provide various type of banking services to the customer under PMJDY, SLBC had approved deployment of 2322 Bank Mitras/BC Agents in areas allocated to banks.

To ascertain/verify the availability of Bank Mitras, executives of call centres and LDMs make verification calls to each Bank Mitras to gather information about working/non working of Bank Mitras on weekly basis. Besides Convener Bank is also making verification calls to Bank Mitras directly. The feedback received from all the three is collated on regular basis and shared with Banks for taking corrective action. Non working of Bank Mitras at locations allotted is depriving population of banking facilities and defeating the very purpose of Financial Inclusion.

The bank wise position in Appointment of Bank Mitras is given at Annexure-2. Bank-wise detail of Inactive/not working Bank Mitras is as under:-

Name of the Bank / Bank Mitras not workingas on 30.06.2017
Andhara Bank / 4
Canara bank / 4
Indian Bank / 2
IOB / 1
TOTAL / 11

The details of non working Bank Mitras has been sent to respective banks and they have been advised to replace the Inactive/non working Bank Mitras on urgent basis. Member banks are requested to keep convener bank informed of changes in contact details of Bank Mitras and ensure that Bank Mitras are operational at all locations.

The representative of the member banks who have not appointed the Bank Mitras yet are requested to apprise the latest position to the house.

As on 30.06.2017 out of the total 2322 Bank Mitras only 1646 have been provided with Micro ATMs. The Bankwise status of Micro ATM is given at Annexure-2.

Member banks who have not yet provided the Micro ATM to Bank Mitras are requested to provide the same immediately.

Item No. 6 / Position of Claims lodged/Settled under PMJDY and Jan Suraksha Schemes.

In accidental claims under PMJDY, out of 86 claims lodged under PMJDY up to 30.06.2017, 59 Claims stands settled while 27 are pending.

In PMJDY in case of natural death, out of 62 claims lodged up to 30.06.2017 in the State , 49 Claims stand settled while 13 are pending.

In Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Beema Yojna out of 697 claims lodged 472 claim cases stands settled while 70 claims stands rejected. The number of pending cases are 155.

In Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Beema Yojna out of 1069 claims lodged 964 claim cases stands settled while 13 cases stand rejected. The number of pending cases are 92.

Bank wise position in lodgment and settlement of claims under PMJDY is as per Annexure-3 (Page 96) and for Jansuraksha Schemes is as per Annexure-3(i) (Page 97).

Ministry of Finance pointed out that the ratio of claims to the total account holders in the state is very low thereby implying that the masses are not aware of the scheme and the claims are not being lodged due to the lack of knowledge.

Member Banks are again requested to involve the Local leaders, Sarpanches and official from the department of Registrar, Birth and Deaths in every awareness programme conducted by the banks for schemes launched by Central Government i.e. PMJDY, PMSBY, PMJJBY, PMMY, APY etc.

Item No.7 / Opening of accounts of workers of organized and unorganized sectors.

Secretary, Ministry of Labour & Employment vide DO letter dated 25.11.2016 addressed to Chief Secretary, Government of Punjab has desired that in order to facilitate financial inclusion of workers and to ensure timely payment of their wages, a campaign to open bank accounts in respect of those workers of organized and unorganized sectors who do not have their own bank accounts even now. Camps for opening the accounts have to be conducted at each district and a committee comprising the collector cum District Magistrate, Lead District Manager of the bank, the Labour Officers of the Centre as well as the State Government representative which will decide the location of these camps and other relevant modalities.

Member Banks/LDMs are requested to extend full cooperation in holding of the camps for opening of accounts of workers of organized and unorganized sectors

Item No. 8 / Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY) and Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY).

As per the announcement in the Budget speech of 2015, two insurance schemes namely Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY) and Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY) and a new pension scheme called Atal Pension Yojana (APY) were launched to move towards creating a universal social security system for all Indians especially the poor and the under-privileged.

In PMSBY, any person between the age of 18-70 years can subscribe to the scheme and the annual premium is `12/- whereas in PMJJBY, any person between the age of 18-50 years can subscribe to the scheme and annual premium is ` 330/-. The achievement under the schemes is as under:-

Name of the scheme / Achievement as on 31.03.17 / Achievement as on 30.06.2017 / Increase in the quarter
PMSBY / 3257853 / 3567155 / 309302
PMJJBY / 601054 / 621856 / 20802

The Bank-wise progress in respect of both the schemes is as per Annexure-4. (Page 98)

The house may deliberate.

Item No. 9 / Atal Pension Yojana (APY)

Under the Atal Pension Yojna Scheme (APY), depending upon their contributions, the subscribers, under the age of 40, would receive the fixed monthly pension of `1000 to ` 5000 at the age of 60 years. Ministry of Finance has recently amended Atal Pension Yojana (APY) to give an option to the spouse to continue to contribute for balance period on premature death of the subscriber. After the death of both, the nominee of the subscriber shall be entitled to receive the pension wealth, as accumulated till the age of 60 years of the subscriber.