Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY)

Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) is National Mission for Financial Inclusion to ensure access to financial services, namely, Banking/ Savings and Deposit Accounts, Remittance, Credit, Insurance, Pension in an affordable manner. The objective of the scheme is to provide universal access to banking facilities with at least one basic banking account for every household.

Jan Dhan Yojana is also playing the role of empowering the masses through government’s historic initiative of JAM Trinity which encompasses the three critical spokes of financial inclusion namely Prime Minister Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), Aadhaar and Mobile connectivity (JAM), with an endeavour of realizing the goal of bringing the vast majority of the poor, weaker sections and the downtrodden into financial mainstream of the nation. JAM is one of the key reforms launched with a holistic view to directly transfer subsidies, minimum wage payments for various government schemes and other payments to the targeted beneficiaries bank accounts through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) scheme.

PMJDY ensures access to various financial services like availability of basic savings bank account, access to need based credit, remittance facility, insurance and pension to the excluded sections, i.e., weaker sections and low income groups. This deep penetration at affordable cost is possible only with effective use of technology.

Accounts under PMJDY can be opened in any bank branch or Business Correspondent (Bank Mitra) Outlet with Zero balance. The special benefits under PMJDY include provision of life cover of Rs. 30,000 payable on death of the beneficiary, subject to fulfillment of the eligibility condition, accidental insurance cover of Rs. 1 lac, access to pension, insurance products, interest on deposit, no minimum balance required and easy transfer of money across India. As mentioned above, beneficiaries of Government Schemes will be entitled to get direct benefit transfer into their accounts. After satisfactory operation of the account for 6 months, an overdraft facility can be availed of by the account holder.

The scheme is being monitored by Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Finance; Govt. of India and had started showing a good response from the masses from the very first day of its launch with opening of as many as 1.5 crore (15 million) bank accounts. Jan Dhan Yojana features in Guinness Book of World Records : Guinness World Records recognised the achievements made under PMJDY for opening 18,096,130 accounts by Banks in a week (from 23 to 29 August, 2014) as a part of Financial Inclusion Campaign. By 1 June, 2016, over 22 crore bank accounts had been opened under the scheme with total deposits of Rs. 384.11 billion. Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal received 29% of the total deposits under the scheme; and Kerala and Goa achieved the distinction of complete financial inclusion by being the first two states to provide one basic bank account to every household.