Bankers' Club

Responding to a questions on allegations that banks have deposited one rupee in Jandhan accounts to reduce number of zero balance accounts, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said 4 PSU banks are investigating that whether money in some Jandhan accounts was deposited by account holders or by business correspondents to keep the number of zero-balance accounts low. Banks will submit their reports to Department of Financial Services. The statement was given by Finance minister after the meeting with heads of public sector banks to review their quarterly performance.

Indian Express, through an RTI query revealed that bankers in some branches of Punjab and Sind Bank, Punjab National Bank, Bank of Baroda and Bank of India and other public sector banks have themselves deposited one rupee and in some cases two rupees to ten rupees in the Jandhan accounts to reduce the number of zero-balance accounts.

Jaitley also said there are 24 crore Jan Dhan accounts but Rs. 42,000 crore have been deposited in them. “Those 24 crore accounts mostly have people from weaker sections. Now those people have deposited Rs.42,000 crore in these accounts. The figure of Rs. 42,000 crore cannot be arrived at by adding Re 1,” he said.

Punjab National Bank topped the list of Re.1 accounts alleged to be deposited by bankers themselves, whereas Bank of India was second in the list.