Bhubaneswar: Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Thursday launched 2000 CSP Plus outlets under ‘AMA Bank’ to provide banking services in all unbanked panchayats of the state.
Financial inclusion is the foundational premise of social and economic progress and empowerment of people. Reaching out to the people at the bottom of the pyramid and delivering public services to the last mile fairly and transparently has been the highest priority agenda of the government, an official release said.
However, financial inclusion has remained a challenge as the geographical penetration of banks in the state has been rather dismal. About 65% of total gram panchayats do not have a brick-and-mortar bank branch, leading to severe challenges and difficulties in accessing banking services and availability of Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) for a majority of people in rural Odisha.
Therefore, the state government in collaboration with 6 public sector banks namely SBI, PNB, UBI, UCO Bank, Bank of India, and Bank of Baroda launched the ambitious and people-centric scheme named ‘Ama Bank’ for providing banking services through CSP Plus banking outlets to every unbanked GP.
The scheme is being implemented in a phased manner to cover all unbanked GPs of the State within the current financial year 2023-24. The government of Odisha is providing rent-free banking space for 5 years along with electricity and internet connectivity. The State Government is also bearing one-time expenses for Fixed Costs & Recurring expenses for three years. A provision of Rs 500 Crore has been made for this purpose.
In the first phase, 750 CSP plus outlets were opened which are rendering full-fledged banking services like deposits, advances, remittances, Loan, Aadhaar-Enabled Payment Systems, credit linkage to SHGs, coverage under social security schemes, etc free of cost.
The poor people living in rural areas do not have to travel long distances anymore to avail the benefits under different schemes, particularly KALIA, MAMTA, and old age Pension or to apply for a small business loan.
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