By Alex Guite
LAMKA, September 2: Banks in Churachandpur district are witnessing mad rushes of people trying to open their accounts since the launch of the Prime Minister Jan Dan Yojana on August 28.
Most bank branches in the district don’t have the required man power to meet such rush, which the public fail to understand. They are only roused by claims of local politicians during the launch of the scheme that the government will be depositing money in their account.
The ill-informed public are of the opinion that a mere opening of the bank account under the scheme will automatically reward them by way of deposition of Rs 1 lakh by the government.
Managers of several major bank branches in the district have told the IFP correspondent that the fact is far from the people’s perception.
UBI, Churachandpur manager AN Jha said there is still no clarity as to who will be paying the Rs 1 lakh insurance and the only fact is that the said life time zero balance account will be granted as per the transaction of the account holders in the first six months of the account opening
He said the scheme was launched by the Prime Minister of India withe main objective of making atleast one or two members of a household in the country accessible to banking facilities.
Now the ill-informed public is thronging the banks in town since early morning with the belief that the sooner they get their account, they will be blessed with Rs 1 lakh.
This has ensured that in some banks their account application forms have been running out of stock since Saturday.
The insufficient man-power coupled with the bad internet service at the banks only ensured that the people are made to stand in queue for more than four hours to submit their account applications.
At the same time, there was also a rumour in Lamka town that the accounts of those who open in the first one month will be increased by Rs 2 lakhs.
This has been rubbished as a rumour and unpractical by the SBI, Churachandpur manager.
A social worker of the district CT Lian Guite said there was no rush to open bank account as there was still a lot of time.
He said the people are leaving their hectic work schedules due to the scheme.
The UBI manager AN Jha added that under the PMJDY, the account holder will get Rs 1 lakh insurance benefit in case of death in accident, however if the cause of death is natural, the insurance is only Rs 30000.
Being a news scheme, the full details are awaited, the manager acknowledge but added that the period for opening of accounts under the scheme is till January 26, 2015.
Meanwhile, sources have also said that there are people who have opened multiple numbers of accounts in different banks under the scheme in the hope of getting more money.