The central bank, Reserve Bank of India has postponed its financial inclusion plan up to March 2012. The apex bank had set the aim of bringing banking services to every village whose population is 2000 and over.
The goals of the RBI and the government have now become the same. The finance minister, Pranab Mukherjee in his Budget speech for this fiscal fixed the target for reaching total financial inclusion by March 2012.
RBI had established a sub committee to prepare a plan “to provide banking services through a banking outlet in every village having a population of over 2,000, by March 2011”.
An RBI notification said, “It is advised that the date of providing banking services through a banking outlet in every village having a population of over 2,000, is revised to March 2012”.
Mukherjee had said: “It has been decided to provide appropriate banking facilities to habitations having population in excess of 2,000 by March, 2012.”
The RBI notification elaborated further, “In view of (this)…It has been decided to modify the format of the statements so as to obtain detailed information about allotted villages and progress in opening banking outlets in the allotted villages”.