The country’s umbrella body for all retail payments system, National Payments Corporation (NPCI), has reached a new milestone with successful linking of as many as 15 crore bank accounts with the Aadhaar numbers, moving closer to map the overall 17 crore DBT accounts.
The Reserve Bank-promoted NPCI said it expects that all beneficiaries of all government subsidies/benefit transfers will be brought under the linkage programme.
“The current focus is on linking bank accounts of 17 crore DBT (direct benefit transfer) beneficiaries with Aadhaar before June 30,” NPCI said in a statement. “This electronic benefit transfer programme will not only be unique but also be one of the largest in the world,” said the agency’s chief A P Hota.
The government has been focusing on DBT to plug leakages and save cost. To push DBT and financial inclusion, the government last year launched Jan Dhan scheme under which banks have opened more than 12.5 crore accounts by January 26.
NPCI is the nodal agency for all retail payment systems under the Jan Dhan scheme. “The extent of leakage prevented due to this unique system would be visible on completion of running the scheme for about a year,” Hota added.