Having been granted approval by the Reserve Bank of India to launch a payment bank earlier this year, the National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL) plans to float such bank in less than a year’s time.
Speaking to the media at an event to celebrate NSDL crossing Rs.100 lakh crore in value of assets held in the depository, its Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer GV Nageswara Rao said they would focus on bringing customers into the digital payments ecosystem.
“NSDL’s role as a facilitator for Permanent Account Number (PAN), national payment system and National Skills Registry would come in handy to build up a customer base for banking,” Rao pointed out.
The central bank had given in-principle approval to 11 entities to launch payment banks in August this year, and this approval is valid for 18 months for the applicants to comply with the requirements of the Licensing Guidelines.
Besides NSDL, those given the RBI nod to launch payment banks are Reliance Industries, Aditya Birla Nuvo, Vodafone, Airtel, Department of Posts, Cholamandalam Distribution Services, Tech Mahindra, Fino PayTech, Sun Pharma’s Dilip Shantilal Shanghvi and PayTM’s Vijay Shekhar Sharma.
