State Bank of India, the country’s largest bank, plans to scale up its rural book in keeping with its objective to increase financial inclusion. The bank plans to increase its rural lending book by 25% and its deposit base by about 28%,’’ said Jayanta K Sinha chief general manager, rural business, SBI. The bank is also in the process of teaming up with corporates, who would be Business Correspondents(BC). “In keeping...

Reserve Bank of India has set a projection of fove years by which mobile banks would be penetrating to every village of India, said KC Chakraborty, Deputy Governor of RBI.   Chakraborty firmly said that in five years time every villager would be financially included. Mobile bank is a movable vehicle which reaches a particular region at a specified time. Every mobile bank is authorized by some bank and is operated by bank...

The Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, on Friday reviewed the progress towards financial inclusion by banks in India. Dr Singh was briefed on the efforts being made by banks to reach banking services through information and communication technology based models and banking intermediaries to 73,000 rural habitations having population of over 2000 as per the 2001 census by March 2012. The Prime Minister also reviewed the safety and security measures...

`Financial Inclusion' as defined by the committee of financial inclusion is the process of ensuring access to financial services and timely and adequate credit, where needed by vulnerable groups, such as weaker sections and lower income groups at an affordable cost. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has selected Baikunthpur village in Narayanpur block of Mirzapur district to provide banking services to the villagers under its financial inclusion programme. The programme...

One of the most intriguing features of India's agrarian economy in recent years is the persistence of agrarian distress in many regions, even while agricultural credit flow has risen sharply. Rising flow of credit to agriculture is normally associated with buoyancy in the farm sector. A closer look at the data on agricultural credit reveals that what is termed agricultural credit may have very little to do with agriculture, the...