In sync with the digital India dream,more than 200 villages across the country have now become cashless, connecting with Airtel’s Payments Bank.
The company has now aimed at enabling 5,000 villages to adopt the digital payment mode embracing its banking platform.
Majority of these villages are in Rajasthan, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
The villages,which earlier had no access to formal banking ,now have basic banking services and the option of digital banking due to the assistance of Airtel Payments Bank.These villages now atleastr have one Airtel Payments Bank,which provides provides banking services such as deposits, withdrawals and money transfers,reported the Times of India.
According to the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) guidelines,these payment banks do not offer loans and several other facilities that are offered by full-fledged banks, and are not allowed to accept deposits over Rs 1 lakh. But, they can be of immense help in taking banking services across the country and into remote areas.
The RBI recently given its nod to the India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) to start its operations. IPPB became the third entity after Airtel to get the central bank’s nod to start operations.
Explaining about the initiative, Shashi Arora, MD and CEO of Airtel Payments Bank, said, “With this initiative, we are taking banking services to the unbanked and also enabling them to be less reliant on cash.”
The company has invested Rs 3,000 crore in operations and plans to build a digital payments ecosystem with over 5 million merchants. Already over a million merchants are on board the platform.
