With all government welfare schemes switching to the direct benefit transfer (DBT) regime soon, the Centre is hopeful that the high incidence of zero-balance accounts in the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana will come down substantially.

“With more people becoming beneficiaries under the DBT and receiving cash transfers, there should be a significant reduction in zero balance or no-activity accounts under the PMJDY,” said a senior government official.

Insurance cover under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Suraksha Yojana is also linked to these accounts and will improve the transaction status, the official added. The issue of zero balance accounts has dogged the government’s ambitious financial inclusion scheme that was launched in August 2014, with critics pointing out that bank accounts are not sufficient if there is no activity associated with them.  Of the 21.68 crore bank accounts opened under the PMJDY scheme, a quarter or 26.39 per cent have zero balance. In the past one year, zero-balance accounts have substantially reduced from a level of 45 per cent in September 2015 with schemes such as DBT PAHAL or cash transfer for cooking gas kicking off.

Linking mobile numbers The Finance Ministry has also asked banks to link mobile numbers and speed up Aadhaar seeding of beneficiary accounts with the passage of the Aadhaar Bill in Parliament. “This will also help the DBT programme by verifying the beneficiaries identity and improve the pace of financial transactions,” said the official.

 At present, just 9.68 accounts are seeded with Aadhaar numbers.

59 schemes The government had transferred ₹61,824.30 crore through DBT in 59 schemes to beneficiary accounts in 2015-16. Of this, transfer towards Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme was ₹ 25,861.77 crore, and ₹21,421 crore for DBT PAHAL.  The government has now decided to include all Central sector schemes as well as third party transactions such as payments to workers under various schemes through the DBT.

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