M F AHMAD
Daltonganj, June 23: The Palamu regional office of the Jharkhand Rajya Gramin Bank (JRGB) in Daltonganj has stepped up its financial literacy drive in the districts of Palamu and Garhwa.
The regional manager (RM) of Palamu JRGB Mukesh Verma said the NABARD has made available a state-of-the-art bank on the wheels as NABARD is the custodian and regulator for it.
This bank on wheels is to cover 2 districts Garhwa and Palamu which is itself a huge task but at the same time, this is one step forward for the financial literacy drive among the masses.
Sources said neither the national banks, the regional banks, the private banks nor the regional banks have ever made people aware of the risk in haphazard banking than the cyber frauds that have made people alert and cautious to a great extent about their accounts and savings there. Cyber frauds have made customers more protective of their money in the bank and those who let their guard off, rue their luck as cyber thugs then make a heyday with their cash.
Mukesh Kumar said the idea behind this bank on the wheels is to make outreach in areas bereft of the banking facilities.
However, the RM was modest enough to concede by saying, “We can’t be loud-mouthed that with this single bank on the wheels we will be catering to the financial need of the customers of both the districts Palamu and Garhwa.”
However, there it can serve two purposes. First, the bank on the wheels can create awareness about safe and secured banking. Further, it may make people know how to save their hard-earned money.
Mukesh Kumar said the bank on wheels offers credit and debit facilities both. A customer can deposit a maximum of Rs 25,000 in cash while for debit the maximum amount is Rs 10,000.
The RM said the safety and security of the bank on the wheels are right at the top of our concern. He said there are inbuilt safety measures besides the provision of an armed guard in it also. The bank on the wheels is fitted with 4 CCTV cameras.
Sources said the bank on the wheels is no happy sight to the money lenders as there is no village or panchayat where there is not a network of money lending people who charge at the rate of a minimum of 5 percent interest a month on any amount of loan so given.
Sources said the Palamu JRGB has made significant strides in rural banking but there are still left many grey areas where rural banking has to be strengthened.
Mukesh Kumar said, “We have 700 customer service points in the whole of the Palamu and Garhwa districts and we understand these customer service points do take more liberty than required with their customers.”
“We assure our esteemed customers that in event of any complaint, inconvenience, or erratic banking services at these customer service points, they should feel free to bring their issues before the nearest branch of our JRGB. We will tame and contain errant customer service point owner,” he added.
Sources said women self-help groups have even made a thumb using women to use terms like passbook, ‘paisa nikalna’, ‘paisa dalna’ etc which about 20 or 25 years ago was unheard of things.
Mukesh Kumar said he has made it a point that branches of Jharkhand Rajya Gramin Banks have financial literacy interaction with the customers and visitors who come to the banks every fortnight or month.
The bank on the wheels which was flagged off late Wednesday evening did not roll out for any stop over at any bank dry location either on the day of flagging off that is Wednesday or it can do any stop over till this Sunday for technical reasons of the registration of this vehicle which has doubled up as bank on the wheels said sources.
The RM said we hope our bank on the wheels will be rolling out from this Monday.
The bank on the wheels offers an ATM facility too as rural customers are now pretty used to it but some make mundane errors by sharing details of the accounts etc with the unverified callers who are invariably the cyber thugs and when money gets siphoned off by them these people cry in the wilderness.
The RM said our bank on the wheels has enough safeguards to foil and abort any intrusion of the cyber thugs.
