1.55 lakh post offices to become access points for the India Post Payments Bank (IPPB)
The Department of Posts has installed 976 ATMs which are mostly located in the rural areas of India, union minister Manoj Sinha informed the Lok Sabha.
The minister said that the Department of Posts has set up India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) as a Public Limited Company on August 17, 2016 under the Companies Act 2013, to further the financial inclusion objectives of the government.
The IPPB has launched operations in Raipur (Chattisgarh) and Ranchi (Jharkhand) with 8 access points on January 30, 2017. It is proposed to set up access points co-located with district level post offices in up to 650 districts with linkages to all the post offices throughout the country by September, 2017, subject to feasibility and fulfillment of regulatory requirements.
Thus after complete roll-out, approximately, 1.55 lakh post offices will become access points for the IPPB. Read: India Post launches payments bank Sinha said that IPPB has not installed any ATM, as of now. IPPB has issued 1,619 Debit Cards of which 832 debit Cards have been issued in Jharkhand and 787 debit Cards have been issued in Chattisgarh.
The minister said that many companies have approached the Department of Posts for IPPB which include domestic and international financial entities in the field of banking, insurance, international money transfer, mutual funds etc. Some preliminary discussions had taken place with International Finance Corporation (World Bank); no formal proposal to this effect has been received.
While the department is in various stages of discussions with them, decision on formal partnerships will be taken after carefully evaluating the entire value proposition that they propose for the common man, he said.
