Around 3 crore new accounts under Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) are likely to be opened during the current financial year, according to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the government's flagship financial inclusion programme PMJDY on August 28, 2014. The PMJDY scheme has done very good in rural/semi-urban areas of the country. Under the scheme, the number of bank accounts grew nearly four-fold from 14.72 crore in March 2015, to 53.13 crore as on August 16, 2024.
Total deposits under PMJDY have increased from Rs 15,670 crore as of March 2015, to over Rs 2.31 lakh crore as of August 2024. The average balance in PMJDY accounts has increased from Rs 1,065 in March 2015 to Rs 4,352 as on August 16 this year and around 80 per cent of accounts are operative.
PMJDY is one of the biggest financial inclusion initiatives in the world under which the total number of accounts opened crossed 53 crore. Of the total accounts opened under the scheme, almost 66.6 per cent accounts are opened in rural and semi-urban areas. Of the total 53.13 crore PMJDY accounts, 29.56 crore (55.6 per cent) belong to women account holders.
Today, 99.95 per cent of all inhabited villages have access to banking facilities within a 5-km radius through banking touch points (including bank branches, ATMs, banking correspondents (BCs), and Indian Post Payment Banks), the ministry said.
One of the major key features of the PMJDY is that there are no account opening charges, no account maintenance charges, and no minimum balance charges. Also, a free RuPay debit card, with in-built accident insurance cover of Rs 2 lakh, and access to an overdraft facility of up to Rs 10,000, are other major features of the scheme.
