eGov October 2014

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ASIA’S FIRST MONTHLY MAGAZINE ON E-governance ` 75 / US $10 / ISSN 0973-161X

October 2014 | VOLUME 10 | ISSUE 10

Anurag Jain Joint Secretary (FI) Dept of Financial Services Ministry of Finance, Govt of India

Dr Deepali Pant Joshi Executive Director Reserve Bank of India

K P Bakshi Development Commissioner (Planning) and Additional Chief Secretary Govt of Maharashtra PIN*****

Geetanjali Mishra GM – Government Business State Bank of India

Kishore Kharat General Manager (FI) Bank of Baroda

Subrata Gupta Chief General Manager NABARD

Rajagopal Devara Secretary-Cooperation Marketing & Textiles Dept Govt of Maharashtra

L M Deshmukh DGM (FI & SLBC / IT) Bank of Maharashtra

Financial Inclusion Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas

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Contents

october 2014

corporate

volume 10 n  issue 10

8

30 K P Saha MD and CEO, Senrysa Technologies

34 Shashank Joshi Managing Director, My Mobile Payments Ltd

Financial Inclusion for Inclusive Growth

36 Abhishek Pandit Director (Business Services), AISECT

Government 12 Anurag Jain

20 Dr Deepali

38 Ravi Gupta

Pant Joshi

Vertical Head, Enterprise & Public Sector, Enterprise Solutions Group, Intel

22 Kishore Kharat

40 Narayana Menon

GM (FI), Bank of Baroda

Director-Marketing, APAC, Middle East & North America, Sanovi Technologies Pvt Ltd

16 Dr Aruna

24 Geetanjali Mishra

Additional Chief Secretary and Development Commissioner, Panchayat and Rural Development Department, Madhya Pradesh

GM – Government Business, State Bank of India

46 Bhaskar Joshi

18 Dr Dinesh

29 Subrata Gupta

Chief Executive Officer, CSC, e-Governance Services India Limited

Chief General Manager, NABARD

50 Rajagopal Devara

32 Pawan Kapoor

Secretary-Cooperation, Marketing & Textiles Department, Government of Maharashtra

Chief Executive Officer, HCBL Bank

52 K P Bakshi

44 Rahul Modi

Joint Secretary (FI), Department of Financial Services, Union Ministry of Finance, Government of India

14 K Shivaji Principal Secretary, Finance (Expenditure), Government of Maharashtra

Sharma

Tyagi

Development Commissioner (Planning) and Additional Chief Secretary, Government of Maharashtra

4

Banking

egov / egov.eletsonline.com / October 2014

Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India

Managing Director, Adarsh Credit Cooperative Society Ltd

Senior Manager-Marketing, Office Imaging Solutions Center, Canon India

48 Gunjan Sachdev

General Manager & National Business Head (Toughbook Division), Panasonic India

Better Late than Never

S

ince India’s independence 67 years back, the country has seen development on lot many fronts, making it the second fastest growing economy in the world today. But, providing financial services to more than 40 percent of the population, living mostly in the rural areas, and bringing them in the financial mainstream still remains a challenging task. Those financially excluded segments of our society are yet to get connected and contribute meaningfully towards an inclusive growth of the Indian economy.

Although the idea of financial inclusion is not something new and has been the buzzword at the Reserve Bank of India since 2005, it has seen only limited success over the years. In recent times, the most significant thrust to the idea has come in the form of Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), which targets to open 7.5 crore bank accounts by January 2015. The ambitious financial inclusion programme, getting a direct push from Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, envisages access to banking accounts for all the unbanked people with overdraft facility of Rs 5,000 each. They would be provided with a RuPay debit card and Rs 1-lakh inbuilt accident insurance cover.

The PMJDY, like other financial inclusion programmes, will not only connect the financially excluded people directly with the economy, by inducing them to make savings, it will also guard them against the greedy, unscrupulous traditional money-lenders. Besides, the habit of making savings will also provide them with a monetary cushion in their rainy days, thus making them financially sound and adding to their overall prosperity.

With a view to promoting the Modi Government’s vision to ensure inclusive growth through financial inclusion, we decided to turn Jan Dhan Yojana into the theme of this issue of eGov. Besides, Elets Technomedia is also going to organise its second edition of “Financial Inclusion & Payment Systems (FIPS) Summit 2014”. By bringing together the various stakeholders of the BFSI sector, the event will highlight the crucial role that the government agencies, banks, NBFCs and payment companies are playing to promote financial inclusion.

The Conference, Awards and Exhibition during the Summit will, thus, not only take forward the agenda of the government to provide access to financial services to one and all, but also bring to fore the challenges impeding the humongous task in a culturally diverse and geographically expansive country, and throw up possible solutions thereof.

See you at FIPS Summit 2014!

ravi guptA Ravi.Gupta@elets.in

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ASIA’S FIRST MONTHLY MAGAZINE ON E-governance

october 2014 volume 10 n issue 10

Partner publications Chairman: Dr M P Narayanan Editor-in-Chief: Dr Ravi Gupta

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Cover story

Financial Inclusion for Inclusive Growth

Balanced economic growth of a country can’t come about without the financially-excluded sections of the society coming into the mainstream of the nation’s financial system, writes Sunil Kumar of Elets News Network (ENN)

D

espite finances being a necessity, a large section of people mostly in the rural areas are not aware of the art of managing the hard earned money to make it grow, so that it stands by them in their hours of need. Due to their financially ignorance, they are also prone to falling in the hands of greedy money lenders.

In such a scenario, financial inclusion holds special significance for India, as majority of the Indian population resides in rural areas. Besides, bringing progress and prosperity in the rural areas, it also augurs well for the overall economic development of a country like India. It allows poor households to save and manage their money in a secure manner, decreases their exposure to economic shocks in the form of drought, floods or any calamity of the kind which affects people dependant on agricultural activities.

Financial inclusion refers to the strategies adopted to reach banking activities and its benefits to the unbanked areas; it is a drive to bring the underprivileged people into the mainstream. However, the connotation of the term financial inclusion does not restrict itself to credit alone; it also includes generating financial awareness, knowledge about banks and banking channels, facilities provided by banks and the advantages of treading the banking route. Besides, it also entails the task of educating people and making them financially literate.

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Status in India The Indian banking industry has been able to penetrate only less than half of the population over the last few decades. The statistics on financial exclusion in India provides a depressing picture. Out of the over 600,000 rural habitations in the country, only about 30,000Â or just 5 percent have a commercial bank branch.

Just about 40 percent of the population across the country has bank accounts and this ratio is much lower in the north-eastern part of the country. The proportion of people having any kind of life insurance cover is as low as 10 percent and that of those with non-life insurance cover is an abysmally low 0.6 percent. People having debit cards comprise only 13 per cent and those having credit cards a marginal 2 percent.

cover story

Out of the total number of saving bank accounts, a vast majority are dormant. Status of active ‘no-frills accounts’ is no less alarming, as all across India, less than 10 percent of such accounts are active. In the absence of financial literacy, very few conduct banking transactions and even few receive credit from formal financing channels. Millions of people across the country are thereby denied the opportunity to increase their earning capacity and entrepreneurial talent and continue to struggle with their limited resources.

Despite some sincere efforts to make financial inclusion work in the country, most of the objectives of such exercises still remain unachieved. The main factors attributed to these failures are absence of technology, lack of reach and coverage, and inefficient delivery mechanism, among others.

Broad-based financial inclusion remains need of the day, as there is hardly any instance where transition from an agrarian system to a post-industrial modern society has happened

Jan Dhan Yojana t Plan aims to end financial untouchability t Govt targets bringing 7.5cr people in banking services by Jan 26 t New account holders to get `1-lakh inbuilt accident insurance cover t Those opening account before Jan 26 next year to get additional `30K life cover t New accounts to come with `5k overdraft facility t Banks create record by opening 1.5cr accounts on the plan launch day t Bank accounts to give the poor ammunition to fight poverty t Financial inclusion best way to alleviate poverty t Around 10cr people are not covered by the banking system

without setting up of a robust financial system.

The RBI move With a view to driving India to the path of cm regulator Reserve financial inclusion, T:18.9 banking

Bank of India initiated the Business Correspondent model in 2006, wherein nonbanking financial institutions (NBFCs) that do not accept public deposits, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), microfinance institu-

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Cover story

The FI Paradigm Financial inclusion incorporates micro credit, branchless banking, nofrills bank accounts, savings products, pension for old age, microfinance institutions, entrepreneurial credit etc. In fewer words, Financial Inclusion = NFA + Banks + OFIs + MFI + IT. Thus, financial inclusion is needed for achieving inclusive growth, economic development, social development and equal opportunities to all sections of the society.

tions (MFIs) and other organisations of the kind can act as Business Correspondents and finance the rural community. But the entire process has to be under the central bank’s watchful eyes. Banks can only authorise those entities as business correspondents who are financially sound enough for the purpose. The process was initiated in view of the increasing penetration of NBFCs in rural India.

Based on its previous experience, the RBI recently decided to increase penetration by banks, both public and private, and asked them to draw up Financial Inclusion Plans (FIP) with a view to rolling them out over the next three years. These plans broadly include self-set targets in respect of rural brick and mortar branches opened, Business Correspondents employed, coverage of unbanked villages with population above 2000 as also other unbanked villages with population below 2000 through branches/ BCs/other modes, no-frill accounts opened including through BC-ICT, Kisan Credit Cards (KCC) and General Credit Cards (GCC) issued, and other specific products designed by them to cater to the financially excluded segments. The implementation of these plans is being closely monitored by the central bank.

Leveraging technology Technology plays the biggest enabler to the achieving the goal of financial inclusion.

That’s why, government policies have laid a strong foundation wherein technology can help spread the outreach of financial services.

Leveraging technology makes it easy to leapfrog the barriers of geography for sustainable, scalable financial inclusion.

Some of the technology solutions being implemented today are Smart Cards, biometric ATMs, Point of Service (PoS) devices and mobile phone applications. Leading banking and financial institutions are engaged in providing banking services to the financially under-served through pilots or limited commercial rollouts using either one or multiple

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technologies cited above. Technology solutions are being promoted to address the scalability challenges facing financial inclusion in India and other developing countries.

The use of technology has been the obvious choice to drive the financial inclusion programmes of banks, as the key objectives of such programmes is to reduce the cost of operations without compromising on customer experience and security.

Mobile banking as FI tool Mobile banking transactions refer to transactions through mobile phones by bank customers that involve credit/ debit issued against their accounts. To enhance usage through mobile banking, the threshold limit of transactions permitted without end-to-end encryption was raised from `1,000 to `5,000. Further, the limit of `50,000 per transaction was done away with by permitting banks to fix the limits based on their own risk perception.

With ‘for-profit’ companies being allowed to act as Business Correspondents, which include mobile network operators (MNOs), it is expected that this unique bank-MNO partnership model being piloted in India will provide a boost to mobile payments and help in financial inclusion, given the wide network of the MNOs in terms of providing mobile services to their customers.

Jan Dhan Yojana Most significant move in the recent times came

only weeks ago when Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the launch of ambitious `1 lakh crore financial inclusion plan called Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana. The programme envisages a bank account for 150 million Indians by August 2018.

Making the announcement from the ramparts of historical Red Fort, Modi proposed an overdraft facility of `5,000 for each account and a RuPay debit card with inbuilt accident insurance cover of `1 lakh. The overdraft will be backstopped by a Credit Guarantee Fund. Incidentally, it was a pleasant surprise to see banks opening as many as 1.5 crore bank accounts on the very first day of the launch of the scheme on August 28, 2014.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s maiden budget also aimed at giving a significant push to financial inclusion in the country. The Union Budget 2014-15 reiterated the commitment to set up differentiated banks such as “payments banks” and said the RBI would roll out a framework for issuing licences to such banks.

Payment banks Payment banks can engage limited banking activities such as opening accounts and facilitating deposits and remittances. They, however, are not allowed to offer loans. There has been talk that the RBI may allow players such as India Post to operate as a payments bank. The organisation had applied for a universal banking licence when the central bank had opened the window recently but the RBI had reserved the decision to the government.

A payments bank licence for India Post, which has a deeper post office network than India’s largest lender State Bank of India, should help boost financial inclusion by facilitating banking in the remotest corners of the country. In the Budget, the FM also announced setting up of a Financial Inclusion Mission, which would “particularly focus to empower the weaker sections of the society, including women, small and marginal farmers and labourers.” As part of the mission, the FM proposed to open two bank accounts for each household in the country. A similar move was suggested by the Mor committee, which had recommended the creation of a free Aadhaarlinked bank account for every Indian by end 2015.

These moves should go a long way in pushing financial inclusion in India.

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policy

Anurag Jain, Joint Secretary (FI), Department of Financial Services, Union Ministry of Finance, Government of India

Scaling the Insurmountable Prime Minister’s Jana Dhan Yojana is a massive financial inclusion scheme, being launched on a never before scale. Anurag Jain — the man given the task to implement the scheme across the country—talks to Gautam Debroy and Souvik Goswami of Elets News Network (ENN) about the various facets of the ambitious programme Tell us about Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana.

With the launch of PMJDY, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 28 declared the beginning of the end of financial untouchability in India. Opening of an estimated 1.5 crore bank accounts across the country is an unprecedented exercise in terms of scale in India’s economic history. Besides, this is not merely a bank account, but has other benefits as well including a RuPay debit card, `1-lakh accident insurance cover, and an additional `30,000 life insurance cover for those opening bank accounts before January 26, 2015.

What role will Jan Dhan Yojana play in financial inclusion?

I can elaborate in three different ways. First, the PMJDY is a scheme for Financial inclusion. It’s a growth enabler by itself. It will increase the growth rate of the entire country. Inclusive growth has been the philosophy of the successive governments, as well as the Planning C ommission. And the pres-

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ent government is very much committed to its motto of “Sabka Sath Sabka Vikas”. So, it goes well with that philosophy.

Secondly, the process will actually create a less cash society. So, people will be able to transact based more on the cards than in cash.

Less cash society is better for governance, as it reduces the cost.

Thirdly, the scheme will also create an infrastructure following which the government can pick up all other schemes like Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT), which will be a huge saving for the government by plugging of leakages. There have been studies which show that there will be big time saving for the government as the process will reduce corruption, improve the efficiency of the government and it will also target the subsidies batch.

Financial inclusion is not a new concept. What’s the difference between the initiatives taken by this government and the previous governments?

Difference between the two is that the new approach is a more comprehensive programme.

Earlier financial inclusion used to be some kind of emphasis on the supply side of the banking service. That was all about it. There was drive for Business Correspondents (BCs) in the villages. In 2011, when “Swabhiman” scheme was launched, it was basically covering villages with a population of 2,000-plus, and FI was targeting banking facilities in those villages.

But now this is a comprehensive programme.

At present, it is not just supply of services. We are moving from supply to demand side. We are creating demand in the system. We are putting financial literacy framework into it. Universal access is the first motto, and the second one is financial literacy. We are trying to generate demand as to why you should have bank accounts. We are trying to educate people. We talk about how should people improve their savings, how should they go for savings. The bank account has to have saving, remittances and access to micro credit. And this will create demand and this will come through financial literacy.

We are surveying which are the households that are not covered…we are trying to ensure that each and every household is covered with at least one bank account. When all these are stabilises, we are also talking about giving insurance and pension cover through the same network.

Earlier it was only supply of BC points which relied on offline technology. It was actually binding a customer to a particular agent. That was not a very useful process. Because the customer did not know when the agent would come and when he would be able to withdraw the money. Now it is being an online interoperable account, he can withdraw money, even if there is no agent, from an ATM.

policy

We are also trying for a fix point for these services so that the service will be actually available in six to seven days in a week. That way even the supply side is different and with the use of technology, it is feasible for the customer to use the account. Now both the rural and urban people are using it.

How can the information and communication technology (ICT) play a role in financial inclusion?

As I said, if you have an offline account, you will not feel encouraged to operate the account and keep the money in the bank. In such a situation they are not sure when they will be able to withdraw the money from their account. Now, we are giving them cards which are interoperable. Along with this, Aadharenabled micro ATMs is make peoples’ life easier. Now people are encouraged to keep their money in the bank.

Do you think that mobile banking will revolutionise financial inclusion system in India?

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is doing a pilot project. Through the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, we are giving at least one kind of an outlet throughout the country. Now there

We are covering the entire country by dividing it in several micro planning areas. Each and every village will have a banking facility within a distance of 5 kilometers will be banking guidelines in place with smaller and bigger banks coming in the competition.

Probable post offices will get converted into post banks. All these will create a competition in the system and this will actually create a situation where efficiency will start building and ultimately the winners will be the villagers, customers and we will have a proper financial inclusion.

What are the challenges for financial inclusion?

What measures you are taking for financial literacy in rural India?

What role the state government should play in financial inclusion?

The bankers will be holding camps specifically for literacy. When they will go for opening bank accounts, they are getting the opportunity to interact with the people and the customers.

The customers will be informed about financial literacy. The customers will be told why it is necessary for them to have a bank account, how to use the cards, what are its advantages, etc.

This is a huge challenge. Many people are illiterate. It’s a huge job to educate them. There are so many people who do not have an account. Just reaching out to people is a challenge and makes them aware that the account is sustainable and remains operative and not dormant…it’s a huge challenge.

The state governments have very crucial role to play in this programme. Success of any programme depends upon the state agencies. In fact, we have requested the state governments to make a mission director at the state level. We have also requested the district commissioner (DCs) to be the mission director at the district level. It will ensure proper service and canalising of the energy.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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IN PERSON policy

K Shivaji, Principal Secretary, Finance (Expenditure), Government of Maharashtra

Time to Trash Outdated Practices undertaken by our country’s financial sector are highly conservative which make it difficult for an economy to use available resources for the benefit of other sectors, believes K Shivaji

P

ost 1991, India’s growth has accelerated; our GDP, excluding China, is still quite superior to many other countries. Entire globe is now inching towards China and India.

Thus, there are several factors contributing in terms of global trade, global economy, global finance, but still a large number of people are complaining that they are not getting any good opportunity.

Normally, when we take a good look around our environment, we find that there are very few people who make things happen. There are people who are aware what is happening around them as far as government policies are concerned. However, a large part of population is simply oblivious of the happenings around them. The technology has made the whole world flat. Transactions worth billions of dollars are getting transferred from one part of the globe to the other in seconds at the click of the mouse.

In India, we have

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labour arbitraries, cost advantages, abundance of brain power and ready-to-use talent in every corner of the country. But still we are not able to use these benefits to our advantage.

Traditionally, our observation is that our financial sector works more on the known circles. Only when a person is assured that you are trustworthy, he will lend you the money. But when it comes to depositing, no one is interested in assisting that person in the procedure.

Our financial sector is interested in a known area which is deemed as highly conservative.

We have not devised our own concepts and as a result we can venture in an unknown area only when we are optimistic, which is missing from the scenario. Strategically, these institutional psyche needs to be trashed to bring about a change in the overall regime.

Banks are like any other institutions in India who have been surrounded by fierce competition. The financial space needs to bring in more competition which will improve not only the performance of the employees but also quality of services. The urge to overreach will automatically get generated. Still, large numbers of people are not coming under financial area and thus we

need to reach to people living in remote areas.

Traditionally, many of the banks, especially nationalised banks, did not face any kind of competition. They had very simple nationalised products and did not sync their system with any new diversified products and innovations.

Similar psyche is now being followed around that immediately needs to be abolished from the entire system.

Simple activities like deposit banking, withdrawal through ATMs, cash transfers are not taking place smoothly. In villages, people, instead of depositing money in banks, are saving their cash in household utensils. So that practice has to change by making process easy for people living in remote areas.

Financial inclusion, IT and accounts work best in numbers, but till now the extent to which IT should have undertaken the financial sector is still low. This is a crucial issue that needs to be taken care of as the contribution of IT in transforming some other industries has been proved to be a game changer.

The next issue is the absence of inter-bank transaction portability. Synergy will increase if the transactions become bank neutral. Mobile banking is another topic to be focused upon.

This section is so successful in India that we should piggybank on mobile. Fortunately, RBI has come with differentiated banking license regime and we should take at least one part of the banking sector to benefit the rural areas.

Unless the business model for financial institution is bottom driven, retail based, technology reliant, the dream to reach out majority of people would still be far away.

IN PERSON policy

Dr Aruna Sharma, Additional Chief Secretary and Development

Commissioner, Panchayat and Rural Development Department, Madhya Pradesh

Banking licence Must for Post Offices It is high time we brought non-core banking financial institutions into core banking network, as opening new bank branches in unbanked areas for commercial banks is both time-consuming and cost-intensive exercise, says Dr Aruna Sharma in conversation with Gautam Debroy of Elets News Network (ENN) In terms of financial inclusion, how would you define ‘access’?

Access in financial inclusion should be distinguished between ‘having access’ and ‘gaining access’. For example, ‘having access’ could mean to have a bank account at a far off place where there is difficulty in going and doing transactions. However, ‘gaining access’ is having a financial institution within 5km radius, providing the ease of transaction aided by an on-the-spot storage of biometrics for the purpose, which is not dependent on electricity or internet.

Similarly, with Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, there would be debit card readers, i.e. POS (points of sale), at three major points namely, Pan-Beedi Shops, Public Distribution System shops and liquor shops. With this, the requirement of cash at the village level will get reduced to a considerable extent. On a lighter note, there could be debit limit at the liquor shops.

MP is known to be a pioneer in financial inclusion. You have also adopted common database (Samagra) method. What is the reasoning behind it?

Samagra database enables access to household data. The database is linked to family ID, individual ID, caste, BPL, MGNREGA card, construction labour card, etc. Thus, it gives entitlements to all the G2P (Government to Person) benefits. Linking pension, scholarships or PDS entitlements to the accounts becomes

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licence, as they have all the banking products like deposits, savings, insurance etc. What they do not have is credit-giving facility and that can be taken care of by any of the commercial or financial concerns falling in that area. But, it is very important to immediately bring them in the core banking network, because it is an extremely time consuming and cost-intensive proposition for commercial banks to open new 7,000 USBs/branches.

Apart from setting up a conduit, you are also looking for a paradigm shift in financial inclusion operations. What are you aiming for?

easy with the seeding of bank account number in the Samagra database. Therefore, the Jan Dhan Yojana would ensure ‘Samruddhi’, i.e. prosperity, as the bank accounts will not only facilitate G2P transactions but also act as an enabler to have deposits and recurring deposits.

What is the importance of noncore banking institutions?

We have 17,000 points covering 5km radius, which includes commercial banks, private banks, Ultra Small Banks (USBs), RRBs, cooperative banks and post offices. Out of them, 7,000 are post offices. So, ignoring them is not an option. It is important that they get bank

PM’s Jan Dhan Yojana has enabled us to make great strides towards ‘Samruddhi’ by enabling issuance of debit card to the account holders.

This will help us build up various schemes like Public Distribution System on the debit card depending on their pattern of transactions. It will also be crucial to ensure constant flow of input of financial literacy and counselling in order to avoid bad credit and NPAs.

What is the importance of financial literacy vis-a-vis financial transactions?

Financial literacy is a must. A Rs 5,000 overdraft is a facility not to be misused but to enhance one’s credit worthiness. Financial literacy will educate a person on how and when to use the

IN PERSON policy

facility and on the discipline of repayment. In the absence of financial literacy, banking will become unviable and the account holder will get indebted.

What policy-related suggestions would you make to push financial inclusion in the country?

Acceleration with the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana will definitely translate into prosperity in the hitherto unbanked areas. Owning a debit card with all G2P facilities in the account will go a long way. The policies should be better oriented to specific local requirements so as to negate the possibilities of duplication as far as having a mandatory single account is concerned.

The other important thing is to link the village and ward level data with the state governments’ MIS system, like ‘Samagra’ in Madhya Pradesh and ‘Bhamashah’ in Rajasthan. Tomorrow similar programmes could be initiated in Telangana – the latest state to be formed in India. This MIS enables conversion of entitlements and G2P facilities, thus, making the accounts immediately operative.

What is your opinion about the Jan Dhan Yojana? Do you think the initiative will boost financial inclusion in the country?

The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana will offer benefits that bankers have been reluctant to give. The scheme will give impetus to RuPay card that will soon become a household name.

The offer of RuPay with accident insurance is a welcome step, and many of the insurance schemes can be clubbed with the same where the volume would make the premium negligible. We are happy that the distance paradigm of Samruddhi and household details has been incorporated in the Yojana, which in turn will enable us to accelerate the pace of work.

Tell us something about the Mukhyamantri Samruddhi Bhavan programme.

Under the Mukhyamantri Samruddhi Bhavan

There are 7,000 post offices and they have all the banking products like deposits, savings, insurance etc... It is very important to immediately bring them in the core banking network, as it is an extremely time-consuming proposition for commercial banks to open new 7,000 USBs/branches programme, panchayats in ‘shadow areas’ are given `10-lakh grant to construct a building in case any bank, national or private, decides to open a branch there. In the state of Madhya Pradesh, ‘shadow areas’ were mapped to give priority to open Ultra Small Banks, as those areas that do not have any commercial bank, private bank, cooperative bank, RRB or a post office within 5km radius. This has given impetus to the process of opening bank branches in these areas. 33 such branches have been opened, and the required amount has been given to the panchayats concerned to construct the building. We target to open 100 such Bhavans during this financial year and plan to reach eventually the figure of 300 to saturate the ‘shadow areas’. The ultimate sustainable structure will be one branch with 5-6 Ultra Small Banks.

Shall we need to maintain a database for financial inclusion?

Yes, because in Samagra we have data of every

household, which is being mapped with FI. So, the debit card will carry Samagra family ID, individual ID, name and Aadhaar number (wherever available). Thus, it will not be just numbers in real terms, but we will also know the coverage of households.

If we talk about Madhya Pradesh, is there any time frame for achieving total financial inclusion?

Well, seeing is believing, we are well on way to achieving what we are planning. Sikri Panchayat of Datia district has already issued debit cards with accounts to all, including children, as they get money for scholarships, cycles etc. Students benefit as money is transferred directly to their bank accounts in case of scholarships or other basic requirements. Now, we will start releasing data every month and move towards the set target. Through Samagra, we have attained the experience of G2P, and with this experience we will roll out more and more schemes.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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policy

Dr Dinesh Tyagi, Chief Executive Officer, CSC, e-Governance Services India Limited

CSC plays FI Enabler Simplifying the process for financial inclusion has become the need of the hour to achieve larger objectives, believes Dr Dinesh Tyagi

F

inancial Inclusion has three basic components, namely, banking, insurance and pension.

As part of the Common Service Centres (CSC) schemes, we have created a format for CSC that meets the requirements of all the three components. First is the Banking Correspondent model where we use kiosk technology. Today 12,000 Common Service Centres are using Business Correspondents (BC) to work for all the public sector banks. While in banking industry around 600 crore frauds have been reported, surprisingly not even a single fraud has been reported in these 12,000 centres.

Thus, kiosk technology has proved that even in rural or remote locations banks can work out a solution which is fraud-proof. Before we started the CSC scheme and CSC engagement, there were already about more than 1 lakh BCs. However, a recent study by the Reserve Bank of India showed that 50 percent of them were not actively into the operation.

On further analysis it was found out that BC of mobile nature was also not a workable solution. After this the banking division discussed these two issues with CMDs of all the banks in the country. Thus, the new scheme formulated states that BCs for banks have to be static. With this model in place, CSC is operated by a village level entrepreneur who belongs to same community. His credibility is higher, he is supported by a government scheme and he operates under some kind of supervision monitoring mechanism built in by the state government. Thus, he is more believable for undertaking a banking operation.

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The problem does not end here. The technology is always changing and many of the banks are still trying to get in sync with the new technology to stabilise the process. To our surprise, banks use BCs as mediums for target service approach. Thus, the bank’s vision of a BC is not a business model. However, there are two banks that are exceptions in this case; the first bank that realised BC as a business model was SBI. The second bank which is aggressively pursuing the similar model is Bank of Baroda. Both these banks are not bothered by any service approach.

In a particular state, SBI has appointed all the CSCs as BCs. The distance between the branch and a BC is 200 km. The technology makes it all possible as operations are not hindered by geographical boundaries. Another problem is issuing a passbook when the person can get his/her statements online and take printouts

whenever required. Thus, issuing passbook is unnecessary and excluding them will make the process easy.

Second comes insurance. Today, three percent of India’s population has insurance coverage and rural India’s condition is pathetic. The problem is that people have policies but they are not regular with payment of the annual premium. Only one out of four policies issued is renewed in this country and the person who has been sold the policy feels at a loss because he has no facility in his vicinity to go to and make the payment.

The third is the pension. The person retires and gets his pension but a person belonging to rural area is on his own. For this, National Pension Scheme is a perfect model for creating an unorganised pension tool. CSC operators are now provided money in advance with commission and are told that if a CSC operator undertakes thousand pensions in his area, he gets Rs. 75,000 every year from 18 to 60 years and thus business is assured.

It is a good scheme with social benefit as well as commercial model for CSC. So we have all the components of financial inclusion, banking, insurance and pension. The Private Fund Reporting Depository (PFRD) also needs lot of simplification process. Any simplification process linked with UID would require only print card of PFRD. Thus, filling up forms, sending scanned documents are not required. There is nothing more fool proof than a UID as even signed documents can be fraud but not UID. Bringing in UID would enable simplification of process which in turn would assist in reaching majority of people. Thus, if we concentrate on simplifying the process then a framework like that of CSCs can help achieve larger objectives.

news

Banks told to become fully Aadhaar-enabled Opening of bank accounts would be a simple process, with branches of all banks to be Aadhaar-enabled this very month. Once the process is complete, people will be able to open accounts using their 12-digit Aadhaar number.

The Department of Financial Services has requested all the banks to ensure that their branches are integrated with Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), according to officials. Some major banks like the State Bank of India are already on the Aadhaar platform, with all its branches on it. Branches of all banks across the country are now in the process of being integrated with Aadhaar, a process expected to be completed by the first-half of September.

DGCA launches ‘Know Your Rights’ portal for air travellers Minister for Civil Aviation Ashok Gajapathi Raju Pusapati launched on Tuesday a “Know Your Rights” (KYR) portal of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) in the presence of Minister of State for Civil Aviation G M Siddeshwara and other dignitaries to mark 100 days of the new government.

Describing the features of the KYR portal, DGCA Dr Prabhat Kumar said it would provide information on the rights of passengers in cases of delays, cancellation and denied boarding, lost, delayed, misplaced and damaged baggage; and on matters related to booking, airfare components and refund of air tickets. The information on availability of the Grievance Redressal Mechanism, names of nodal officers and contact numbers would be shared with the public on the portal.

Modi government reiterates vow on online offices Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken his stand of going online very seriously and is reported to have given orders to all central government offices to abide by the same.

According to an order issued in August by the Department of Expenditure, the government has asked its offices to take rigorous measures to reduce dependence on paper.

The letter issued by the government made it binding on the offices to follow orders, pointing out that the earlier given instructions were not being followed properly.

The drive taken towards e-governance is aimed at reduction of administrative expenditure and reduction in use of paper through digitisation in turn saving millions of trees.

The government also wants all leave application forms and other such documents should be online and their manual submissions discouraged.

CIOs will drive PM Modi’s Digital India programme The government has decided to appoint Chief Information Officers (CIOs) in at least 10 ministries to ensure smooth execution of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious Rs 1 lakh crore ‘Digital India’ programme.

Apart from the CIOs, a Minister of Communications and IT Ravi Shankar Prasad-headed Digital India Advisory Group (DIAG) will also be formed to supervise implementation of the programme, according to a senior DeitY officer.

On the role of DeitY in the initiative, he said all the initiatives under the Digital India programme will be coordinated by the Department. Besides, DeitY will also advise during the appraisal of the projects under the programme. This appraisal will cover issues relating to adoption of standards, utilisation of cloud and mobile platform, consideration of security aspects, etc.

Centre tells U’khand to set up ‘virtual cadre’ for eGov The Centre has suggested the Uttarakhand Government to set up a ‘virtual cadre’ for e-Governance taking a cue from Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, which have already taken the first steps in this direction. The Centre’s letter to the state in this regard appears to be a move towards the implementation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Digital India’ mission.

The Centre has recently written to the Uttarakhand government to consider implementing the proposed scheme which the Expert Committee on HR policy for e-Governance has recommended. The panel was set up in pursuance of the decision of the Prime Minister’s Committee on the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP).

“The scheme is suggestive and it would be for respective state governments to consider adapting the scheme depending on their requirements,” R S Sharma, Secretary in the Union IT Ministry, has communicated to the Uttarakhand’s Chief Secretary Subhash Kumar in his letter.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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banking

Dr Deepali Pant Joshi, Executive Director, Reserve Bank of India

Neglected lot to Get Recognition The PMJDY is designed to be a highly intensive programme, which will focus on application of human and material resources, to mobilise poor people and link them to the banking system, says Dr Deepali Pant Joshi, in an interaction with Kartik Sharma and Nayana Singh of ENN

T

he Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojna (PMJDY) is the flagship programme of the Government of India, and the Reserve Bank of India is fully committed to it. It will help promote poverty reduction by building strong institutions and improving access, especially to women, to the mainstream financial institutions. It will also enable the poor to have a range of livelihood opportunities, hitherto denied to them.

Financial inclusion will promote and strengthen the overall livelihood opportunities. It will work by leveraging technologies and skills that people have themselves. It will also provide inputs and market linkages to them

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and in turn provide sustainable and scalable financial inclusion.

This programme is distinct in the sense that while our earlier programmes relied on account penetration, the PMJDY offers a holistic package. It gives a RuPay card, insurance facilities, and is a demand-driven strategy. The programme emphasises on financial literacy, whereby there will be flexibility to develop credit absorption capacities, and specially women will benefit by the provision of creating financial infrastructures. This will lead to a situation where there will be enlargement of choices for poorer people, and this multipronged strategy will lead to continuous capac-

ity building of the targeted poor.

In my opinion, these are the most striking dissimilarities between the PMJDY and the previous programmes run by the Government of India. Firstly, the present programme intends to cover all households in all villages; therefore, the focus is much more comprehensive. The focus of the scheme should be the poorest of the poor and our objective should be to ensure outreach to the last mile.

Secondly, this programme also extends itself to urban areas, and thus we should work towards eliminating urban poverty as well.

Thirdly, our previous approach focused deeply on business correspondents (BCs), who were

The main purpose of planned growth is to mainstream the marginalised, to correct historical inequities and address factors constraining their participation in the growth process

banking

The Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojna will work by leveraging technologies and skills that people have themselves. It will also provide inputs and market linkages to them and in turn provide sustainable and scalable financial inclusion peripatetic. The BCs moved around with a point of sale machine or a bank in a box and there was no certainty of their appearance. Therefore, the people were uncertain as to when and how their financial needs would be met through BCs. Therefore, the concept of bank in a box did not work, as the people rely upon face to face advice. A business correspondent in a fixed location will address this problem and will gather trust of the poorer people. This will give them a confidence that their financial needs will be met at a certain place and in a certain time.

Financial inclusion does not only mean account penetration, but it pertains to the entire script: savings, credit, remittance, insurance penetration, and transactions which should be provided

so that it builds confidence in the financial system. The monitoring system under the earlier programme was a little loose, but now we are going to have a very close monitoring of the functioning of PMJDY. The Finance Minister himself will be monitoring the scheme, which will be moved from the centre to the state to the district to the block level – which in my opinion is a very comprehensive monitoring mechanism. We must place trust in PMJDY because as the old adage goes, whatever is quantifiable and measurable can definitely be achieved. The glitches of the earlier system can be avoided here by use of the RuPay Debit Card and by extending online operations.

It is hoped that with all these efforts, all sections of the labour force are included as productive workers and contribute to the larger processes of economic development, as producers and consumers of goods and services.

We can hope that now all the people will get an equitable share of the economic development, and the contributions and needs of those who have been hitherto neglected get due recognition.

Maximising returns is the goal of economic behavior and this is conventional rationality.

In developing economies such as ours, the poorer people with inadequate resources endure more costs and receive much poorer returns. Hence there is a need for affirmative action of good policies like PMJDY. The main purpose of planned growth is to mainstream the marginalised, to correct historical inequities and address factors constraining their participation in the growth process.

I have openly argued that there is a very strong business case for banks to go to the bottom of the pyramid, but more importantly we must realise that there is a very strong moral imperative of doing this.

The cost of not doing this will be much higher than the cost of doing this. Therefore, I place my full commitment to this initiative and invite the participation of all others to make this a success.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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banking

Kishore Kharat, GM (FI), Bank of Baroda

POS Devices Should replace ATMs Even before the government started assimilating those out of the banking fold, Bank of Baroda had taken a lead by entering the villages through ultra-smart branches, says Kishore Kharat, in conversation with Nayana Singh and Poulami Chakraborty How do you perceive the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana initiative?

This is one of the best steps ever taken by the government, because we started with financial inclusion way back in 2005, which was referred as ‘Banklet’ and is today referred as ‘Banklet Financial Programme’ as per the guidelines of Reserve Bank of India. Between 2005 and 2013, the RBI revised its programme twice, wherein the first guideline was to complete financial inclusion by 2012. But the bankers were not able to complete. The RBI has introduced a segregated financial inclusion plan for 2013 to 2016, wherein all the six lakh vil-

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lages have been identified and allocated to the banks. There are around 40,000 bank branches in these villages to handle this odd issue. Also, these branches are in remote places. Thus, it was difficult for banks to address this, unless government authorities came forward for the cause.

The government authorities have the credibility to open branches from 40,000 to six lakhs – that is, one branch in every village, unlike the bankers, who have limited authority to address the issue. We as bankers, tried to introduce different models to find out whichever works best, of which, Business Correspondent (BC) model is one of the most popular. However, the problem with this model is acceptability by the villagers. Villagers could not trust on our credibility or trust people identifying them as bankers, because there have been numerous instances wherein people have lost huge money through chit-funds and so-called banks. Thus, developing that faith and credibility definitely takes time and more serious approach with government aid is sure to contribute to building faith and confidence of villagers and enrolling them in banking sectors.

For three years the banks were struggling with the economic viability issues of the model.

But now, with the government coming forward with the PMJDY, this model in the banking sector will be given a boost. In 2012, the government again introduced DBT (Direct Benefit

Transfer) and was expected to help banks in its implementation by identifying the beneficiaries and other aspects, which did not happen. At the ground level, the bankers faced a huge challenge of completing financial inclusion with limited resources to their aid. However with PMJDY, the government has taken the right step to rope in government machinery, for the benefit of the citizens of the country.

What initiatives has the Bank of Baroda taken towards financial inclusion?

There are several initiatives. Early in 2011, our bank was trailing behind other banks. It could have been referred as a non-starter, even though we tried adopting several business models of proven success. Then, we tried identifying the problems that we are facing in adopting the several methodologies and the reason behind them. The foremost thing that we have done is to introduce the sense of ownership within our organisation, which has helped us in building and boosting confidence within the organisation. With that we were also able to create awareness amongst our branch managers that with the financial inclusion, there is a business for the banker, as all my branch managers were of the notion that the FI has similar procedure as business correspondent model. We had them convinced that corporate business correspondents are enablers of FI and it is basically our job through monthly meetings held in the town halls across the country.

The second initiative is BC remuneration, because if these business correspondents are not financially happy, then they will not work

banking

under this model. So, it was important for us to my network, which will ensure connectivity pay them competitively. However, there were to all even in far-flung areas. We may deploy limitations for us on this as well. So, we started any technology, but it will not work if they are to pay them directly from our organisation. not talking to my people on a real-time basis.

With that we started to restructure BC remu- Though our data centers across cities are well neration by giving them added incentives on a networked, we need to be updated and aware of the transactions made in rural areas of Manipur stipulated amount of account openings.

The third best initiative that I would like to or Bihar almost instantaneously. Seamless conmention is opening of ultra-smart branches in nectivity being the issue today, we face problem that people in rural areas need awareness on remote villages, which is a step above the BC in our data center reflecting these transactions this. model. BCs are not credible among villagers as immediately.

For banking, we use two kinds of technolo- Access to ATMs and is a basic they might vanish after collecting their money.

Moreover, the villagers have very small amount gies – GPRS for remote areas that do not have problem that people in rural of money to save as their parts have faced source of income is also over the years. low. We started sending How can this be all our officers and link resolved? branch managers with BCs The basic issue for all of in villages once a week. So, us is that we are a cashwhen villagers find managoriented economy. There is ers and officers from banks too much cash transaction accompanying the BCs, in the Indian economy. We they start believing these have to push everything people and automatically to cashless transactions the business increases. somehow. The density of With backdrops and merchant point of sale branding for the BC model (POS) machine needs to in association with the be increased substantially. bank, people started trustProblems like low dening their money with us, sity of ATMs, not having resulting in record number enough cash or going out of bank accounts with of service can be addressed us. The fourth important only with cashless or bankthing is that we ensure that less transactions. In my We started sending all our officers our BCs visit the villages opinion, ATMs should be and link branch managers with BCs in banned from use. On one everyday to make banking easy and convenient. hand, we are advocating a villages once in a week, compulsorily. cashless economy, on the So, when villagers find managers and other hand, we are keeping Please elaborate officers from banks along with the BCs, they ATM boxes across corners, how technology has been start believing these people and automatically making people withdraw more and more. It is high adopted by your the number of business increases, with time, government needs to institution for FI people’s trust and credibility address these issues and take implementation. necessary action towards it.

Also, what Instead of increasing the density of ATMs internet connectivity and wherever there is is the benchmark that the internet, we have kiosks for reflection of trans- across the country, it is important that we industry should set for evolving actions. But both of these have their limitations. increase the density of the POS machines. Even technologies in this sector in the We have more than 5,000 kiosks across the in malls, these machines are not having wireless years to come?

We Indians are very good at technology and its country, which is the highest number recorded connectivity, which is one of the most state-ofexploitation. There is a constant competition yet. Another area of evolution that has picked the-art equipment used across the world. We amongst firms for newer technologies. How- up reasonably over the years is mobile banking, need to improve on these aspects in first place ever, at this stage of technological advancement, which enables customers to bank at the ease of to make it ready availability of money in cashwe need it to provide seamless connection to their fingertips. But the problem lies in the fact less mode across the country.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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banking

Geetanjali Mishra, GM – Government Business, State Bank of India

A pillar of strength, Always The State Bank of India has stood by the country and the government in the toughest times – be it famine, war, financial crisis or natural disasters, and will continue to be committed to the nation, says Geetanjali Mishra

T

he State Bank of India is one of the banks that has always stood firmly behind the government whenever and wherever the need has arisen.

In so many ways it is actually a part of the government. From the owner of a bullock cart to the owner of a private jet, the customers of SBI are from various walks of life spanning across many generations. The Government of India is our biggest and number one customer.

Computerisation in SBI started much before it started in the government sector. By the time government was conscious of technology, we were already on the core banking platform and were stable. So, whenever new changes came, for example, last year we handled the pressure for Direct Benefit Transfer payments, and petroleum and gas subsidies smoothly, and it took us about two months to put the things in place in coordination with Aadhaar, petroleum

marketing agencies, the ministry of petroleum, NPCI and the likes.

We are geared to have extra manpower to deliver whatever is deliverable. But again, the problems are the same as one might have with one’s technology partner, and you may have issues with your staff, because more than technology it is the people issues that matter.

We are proud to be associated with the government in many of the projects. Apart from the passport project, we are now handling a project where people across the world in about 180 countries will be able to pay their online visa fee without the need to visit Indian embassies or VFS or anywhere else; straightaway the Government of India will provide the tourist visas. We are there as a partner to receive the dollar remittances across the world and have, over the time, handled government transactions in a much better way.

We have very recently acquired something called the aggregated

Computerisation in SBI started much before it started in the government sector. By the time government was conscious of technology, we were already on the core banking platform and were stable 24

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banking

We have prepared ourselves to handle the pressure coming from the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana financial inclusion scheme. I think the idea of linking Aadhaar with opening of account is a good one.

PMJDY: Mission Mode Objectives PMJDY to be executed in the Mission Mode, envisages provision of affordable financial services to all citizens within a reasonable distance.

It comprises the following six pillars:t Universal access to banking facilities: Mapping of each district into Sub Service Area (SSA) catering to 1,000-1,500 households in a manner that every habitation has access to banking services within a reasonable distance, say 5 km, by 14 August, 2015. Coverage of parts of J&K, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, North East and the Left Wing extremism-affected districts which have telecom connectivity and infrastructure constraints would spill over to the Phase II of the programme (15 August, 2015 to 15 August, 2018) t Providing Basic Banking Accounts with overdraft facility and RuPay Debit card to all households: The effort would be to first cover all uncovered households with banking facilities by August 2015, by opening basic bank accounts. Account holder would be provided a RuPay debit card. Facility of an overdraft to every basic banking account holder would be considered after satisfactory operation/ credit history of six months. t Financial Literacy Programme: Financial literacy would be an integral part of the Mission in order to let the beneficiaries make best use of the financial services being made available to them. t Creation of Credit Guarantee Fund: Creation of a Credit Guarantee Fund would be to cover the defaults in overdraft accounts. t Micro Insurance: To provide micro-insurance to all willing and eligible persons by 14 August, 2018, and then on an ongoing basis. t Unorganised sector pension schemes like Swavalamban: By 14 August, 2018 and then on an ongoing basis. Under the mission, the first three pillars would be given thrust in the first year.

Source: financialservices.gov.in

services: if you make an online payment, you will see that when it comes to net banking, a choice of list of banks come and below it will be written that ‘by Citrus Pay’ or ‘by Bill Desk’.

So, we will be substituting ourselves in that slot.

Although it is a very expensive proposition, still we want it for the government, so that government money does not move to any of the private aggregators whose servers could be located outside the country. That is one initiative we are trying. Maybe in the next three to four months we will be ready with our own aggregator services, and once RuPay comes, we will be able to give the citizens the best value when it comes to citizens paying to the government or the government making payments to citizens.

We have prepared ourselves to handle the pressure coming from the recent Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana financial inclusion scheme to open accounts. I think the idea of linking Aadhaar with opening of account is a good one.

We are partnering with most of the central and state government departments and whenever there is a crisis in the government, we are there to help. For example, when cyclone Phailin came in Orissa, the State Bank of India branches were kept open round-the-clock for three-four days to provide district collectors and officials money whenever they needed.

Similarly, we were there in the Kargil war and there was not a single day the bank had closed down because the country was at war. So, that kind of commitment we have for the country and we will continue to serve the government with the same commitment.

Octoer 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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banking

L M Deshmukh, DGM (FI & SLBC / IT), Bank of Maharashtra

FI to fly on Aadhaar wings Providing access to banking facilities to all is a herculean task in India, but together with Aadhaar and a right push to the field staff, it doesn’t seem all that difficult to herald the anytime, anywhere banking age, says L M Deshmukh

R

ecently, the Government of India came up with “Sampoorna Vittiya Samaveshan” plan, a comprehensive financial inclusion programme, which was launched by the Prime Minister on 15th August. Bank of Maharashtra has been implementing financial inclusion since 2005 but the focus area has now changed. Earlier, villages were kept in focus for financial inclusion but now families as well have come in prominence. Apart from opening an account, credit will also be made available to all the families who open the accounts under this programme.

Focus on urban excluded Urban financial inclusion, which was not given much attention previously, will also be added in this programme. Financial literacy is an important area which was not integrated earlier, but now it is very much part of financial inclusion. Micro insurance and “Swavalamban” pension scheme have also been introduced in this and the entire programme will be implemented in a timebound manner.

Around 42 percent population of India was without a bank account as per the census of 2011, but since then banks have taken many initiatives for opening accounts. It is still presumed that around 7.5 crore families are not having any account in any bank, and in this one year we have to cover all these families.

In Maharashtra, the condition is a little bit better because out of 2.38 crore families, only 74 lakh families (around 31 percent) are yet to open accounts.

With the introduction of 13,000 BCs (Banking Corre-

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banking cover story

spondents), we will be in a position to provide all these families with bank accounts soon.

The BC model This entire exercise is to be done with the help of BC model, which is the backbone of financial inclusion. BCs are extended arms of the banking industry as they work in the rural areas and are an integral part of the banking industry.

Earlier, when the BC model was introduced in 2006, its authenticity was in doubt and people were not confident about the model. But since then, their vitality has now been authenticated and everybody has warmed up to this model.

Business Correspondents work with biometric authentication and Aadhaar-enabled Payment Systems (AEPS) technology. This technology will create a revolution in the banking industry as currently banks perform on CBS platform, which is a form of branch banking. Then come ATMs where you can withdraw from any bank’s ATM. In case of an ATM a customer is required to come to the ATM, but in the case of financial inclusion, BC model or AEPS technology, BCs go to the customer. This is a much more customer-centric technology and therefore creating a revolution in the banking sector.

Challenges aplenty This system is possible immediately with the introduction of interoperability. But some challenges remain. The first challenge is the sustainability of the BC model as attrition rate of BCs is very high. There is also an issue of affordability.

Some of the other such issues are: In rural areas people do not know why they should open an account in a bank, and that answer lies in financial literacy Cash management in the rural areas as well as in urban areas is also a big challenge in the implementation of the BC model Connectivity issues are also there; in many areas connectivity is not available when the customer arrives Aadhaar ceding is another challenge, bankers are having 65 crore accounts all over India but Aadhaar ceding at present is something around 12-15 crores, i.e., 20 percent; another 75-80 percent are yet to be Aadhaar ceded.

Then there is the sensitisation of the field staff. It could be my branch manager in the field and I accept that they are not happy with the BC model and as bankers from the head office level,

Around 42 percent population of India is without a bank account as per the census of 2011, but since then banks have taken many initiatives in opening accounts. It is still presumed that around 7.5 crore families are not having any account in any bank we have to sensitise these bankers as after this stability is achieved everything will be okay.

ATMs as banks I also visualise about the AEPS technology and BC model technology, where every micro ATM will be situated at every 100 meters distance and people will be able to withdraw their amount from any bank’s ATM anywhere in India as there will be interoperability between the banks.

This is what I am seeing and in that case if all the customers start withdrawing from ATMs, I doubt how many customers will be there in the branches. But I feel that I will be using my branch work as a sales network, just like a sales showroom — like a car showroom where the cars are sold in a showroom whereas servicing is being done at some service centre — I will be using my branch work as sales room and my BC point as a service centre.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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policy

Ram Rastogi, Head, IMPS, National Payments Corporation of India

NPCI

An Unsung Hero The National Payments Corporation of India, though not known well, facilitates millions of transactions everyday and adds to the growth of the nation by aiding high-tech transactions, says Ram Rastogi

W

hen you talk about payments, movement of funds, Aadhaar-enabled payment systems or ATM-based payment system, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is there behind the scene looking after all this like an unsung hero. We do about 20 million transactions a day and are geared up for 50 million more. NPCI is committed to provide services to 65 crore people who are listed with Aadhaar.

We are committed to provide technology which is safe, secure, simple and robust enough. On one hand, Direct Benefit Transfers (DBTs) worth 1.46 trillion dollars happens through us, which works out to eight billion transactions in a year; on the other hand, 145 million households are going to have an account, so if each one of them does one transaction a day, 145 million transactions will happen, again through us.

An amount of 285 million dollars can be saved if the government receipts are digitised and `1.65 crore can be saved if the money is shifted through Immediate Payment Services (IMPS) As a delegate asked about the use of pass book, I would say that there is none, as we are present. We have developed a USSD-based platform *99# where the customer can simply dial this number and we can provide them their account balance and the details of the last five transactions.

An amount of 285 million dollars can be saved if the government receipts are digitised and `1.65 crore can be saved if the money is shifted through Immediate Payment Services (IMPS).

NPCI is committed to add to the growth of the nation, because we believe that a good payment system could increase the country’s GDP by one percent. So, use our services, be happy and serve the nation together.

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cover story banking

Subrata Gupta, Chief General Manager, NABARD

‘Usable Tech’

can Make FI Happen Only bringing in new technology should not be the motto of the government for making financial inclusion more penetrative; instead technology and connectivity should be such that they can be used by everyone, feels Subrata Gupta

G

oogle has become an integral part of our life. We have got so used to it that it feels as if we are using it since birth and it’s something without which we cannot live. Technology is there everywhere now, we cannot avoid it and it is the base for financial inclusion. However, we are missing out on one critical point and which is something I have learnt by implementing core banking solutions

in 201 cooperative banks over the years.

When we go to the field, there are various components like the technology provider, infrastructure, etc. Then you have the user on one hand and the recipient on the other. Usually, when we talk about technology and ways of providing it, we lose focus of the person who is going to use it.

Using technology is a learned skill and does not come just like that. I will give you a simple example of immediate payment systems (IMPS).

We, in collaboration with GIZ, conducted a pilot field study on how a micro finance institution gets all the money routed through IMPS meth-

Usually, when we talk about technology and the ways of providing it, many a time we lose focus of the person who is going to use it

odology from the borrowers. In the study we found out that it takes a period of three months for a person of rural background to feed the numbers in the right way in a device for remittance; this is perhaps one part where a lot of investment and work needs to be done for financial inclusion to be really successful.

Another issue which demands attention is the problem of connectivity. Cooperative banks which have branches in far flung areas like Ladakh and Andaman Nicobar islands face tremendous problems in connectivity. In one of the places in Arunachal Pradesh where we were implementing a project, the authorities got desperate and said they would go in for leased line connectivity. But when an evaluation was made it was found that it would cost something around `13 lakh to put that line at that particular place only.

Now, given the kind of cost for technology, it may be there but I cannot have that prohibitive cost to serve small customers in a rural area. So there is a requirement that we should ensure to take care of the connectivity part in rural areas, otherwise financial inclusion in the way we are thinking might not be able to serve the purpose.

Second thing which I would reiterate here is that there is tremendous need for capacity building, both for the person who will be using the technology and the person who will be delivering it.

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corporate

K P Saha, MD and CEO, Senrysa Technologies

Jan Dhan Yojana Caution is the Key The Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana is just what the doctor must prescribe for all-round well-being of the country, but there’s a need to guard against the operational pitfalls, says K P Saha

T

he concept of financial inclusion dates back to the 60s of the last century. At that time the banks opened their doors to the masses and the central bank insisted on opening rural bank branches and promotion of rural entrepreneurship through outflow of financial assistance. But, people living in the vast, incommunicable areas remained excluded.

In the last couple of years, there was a sort of IT revolution, which surmounted the physical distances. In fact technology is ready to give even the remotely located citizen access to the financial system. Today, a person in a far-flung village can send money instantly from one’s mobile phone. The Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojna is the right political wisdom to fully exploit the IT to harness a holistic economic development of the country.

The bottleneck that could perhaps impede the success of such a gigantic dream is the statutes requiring production of valid documents for account opening. However, this has been taken care of by the RBI; now an account can be opened by simply providing a photograph and putting a signature or a thumb impression on the account opening form. Another welcome change is the introduction of e-KYC. A person having Aadhaar registration can now open an account instantaneously by producing his Aadhaar number.

Apart from the above mentioned benefits,

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the Prime Minister also declared additional incentives in the form of accidental insurance cover and assurance of credit to the new account holders. This instantaneously triggered a huge enthusiasm amongst people, and in the last few weeks we have seen a rush for opening accounts.

Now, here is the other side of the story. The purpose of the project is not served merely with the opening of accounts. With millions of new customers, the banks will also have to issue as many RuPay debit cards. These are to be sent to the customers and the PIN numbers will also have to be mailed in separate covers to the account holders’ addresses, which is a huge task and a big challenge considering intrinsic security threats. The system must guarantee that the cards and PIN numbers do not fall in the wrong hands.

After the cards are distributed another area of concern will emerge. The country has very less or no ATMs at all in the rural sectors, not to speak of bank branches, to give service to the huge additional clientele. Moreover, con-

ventional ATMs cannot accept deposits, so even if there were sufficient number of ATMs, these could possibly cater only to the delivery of direct benefits, but would fail in inculcating a culture of savings and financial habits amongst the people - the ultimate goal of the project.

Another factor that needs to be considered is that in rural areas, payments should be backed by biometric authentication, because this will ensure no misappropriation of money transferred by the government. Now, all customers handled by the BCs cannot have e-KYC because not all have been registered with Aadhaar. The possible alternative is to use central authentication by the banks, for which necessary technology and infrastructure must be introduced by the banks. Central authentication of biometrics may continue till the time customers are not Aadhaar enabled.

Side by side, encouragement by the government is also needed for production of enough number of micro-ATM devices capable of using swipe cards (RuPay). These devices must support biometric capture and printing of transaction receipts, as these are the two basic security factors required for a transaction. Then there should be supply of a huge number of RuPay cards in a short time, which essentially means the presence of capacity to manufacture and personalise a large quantity of cards.

The NPCI must seriously think of inducting additional card manufacturers that are approved and personalisation companies immediately. Technically equipped and financially sound startup concerns are present in the country right at this moment.

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INbanking PERSON

Pawan Kapoor, CEO, HCBL Bank

‘FI moves on people’s Support’ The financial inclusion initiative of the government looks fine, though there could be issues with its implementation, says Pawan Kapoor, in a tete-a-tete with Sneha Mejari of Elets News Network (ENN) How do you perceive the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana?

The Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana is an excellent financial inclusion initiative, but it’s not something new. Such initiatives were undertaken by previous governments as well. The policy and ideas are wonderful provided they are implemented. Most of the people are taking it as a normal government scheme having good policies but they are never implemented.

I and my banker friends discuss a lot on these

initiatives but ultimately we all have the same stories to tell.

The big flaw in this initiative is that the majority of people who apply for bank accounts under this policy already have accounts. So, the very primary objective of this initiative, i.e. bank accounts for all, is defeated. We need genuine people to come and apply for bank accounts and that is what will bring real success to the initiative. There are few such loopholes which need to be taken care of, otherwise the initiative is superb.

How important is financial inclusion for India?

Financial inclusion is necessary if India really wants to grow, and to achieve that kind of growth it is very important to promote banking in remote areas and villages. Today, consumer products like chips, cold drinks and mobile phones have reached the most remote parts of India, but banking has not. People should have access to banking and financial services, and providing this access to banks is the responsibility of the government.

If everybody is linked to the banking system, every transaction can be traced which will benefit the public as well as the government. And this is not only the responsibility of the government but the public as well...everybody should contribute.

How, according to you, we can accelerate the process of financial inclusion in India?

The process of financial inclusion can be accel-

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IN PERSON banking

erated only if citizens think they actually need it. They raise their voice against improper sanitation and inadequate sanitary facilities. This drives the government to launch schemes to resolve their issues, for which crores of rupees are allotted. But this money never reaches the people. If this money comes through banks, no mediator can touch it. All the money will actually go towards helping the needy people.

However, besides this, we also need to bring about financial literacy. We need to explain the benefits of banking to the unbanked citizens.

We hear stories of household women whose hard earned money is taken away and wasted over alcohol by their husbands. This can be totally stopped through providing them access to banking. Along with financial inclusion, we also need social inclusion. People should know what are banks, what are ATMs and banking cards, and the importance of inculcating the habit of saving. Financial literacy will make their lives better. They can become self-reliant.

What is your opinion about providing people with the facility of cashless services?

It is very important to bring in cashless facilities. If we take the recent example of Kashmir floods, people’s homes and their belongings have got washed away. They have even lost all their important documents. In such a situation, cashless facilities will be very helpful. In developed countries like the USA, they have discarded the cheque system long time ago. Now it all works through mobile and online banking.

We all know to carry cash is a risk especially in our country. So, we can use technology and avoid that risk.

Poor ATM density is one problem that the rural economy faces? How can this issue be addressed?

ATM density is indeed a problem in India.

But according to this Jan Dhan Yojana, banks will be opening their branches in rural India which is a very difficult task. Actually there are gaps in the programme. There are two differ-

ent approaches to the issue: while the finance ministry, which is planning to provide proper banking facilities to the people directly, RBI is insisting on documents like Aadhaar cards and PAN cards for opening of their accounts, which makes it very difficult for these people as they cannot produce these documents.

Coming to ATM density, no private bank will open its branches in rural areas. This is due to various issues like electricity and connectivity. Cost of maintaining a bank branch is around Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh, and all this

people. This model, if implemented properly, can actually be very successful.

We had the then RBI Governor Shobha Rao visit this mobile van. She had really liked our idea. But unfortunately after a few weeks, we received a letter from the RBI saying that they did not have a licence to run mobile van banks, so we had to stop. I have raised this issue with our new Prime Minister and hope for a positive response.

In another initiative, we have grouped together Chikan Karigars or artisans, who live

If everybody is linked to the banking system, every transaction can be traced which will benefit the public as well as the government when they would not be getting much business out of these branches. The public sector banks will have to open their branches out of compulsion. But if we look at history, they will turn exactly into RRBs or the Gramin Banks that were opened. They will have to be finally shut down.

Even ATMs need electricity and connectivity without which they cannot function. And now we also have the rule of keeping a security guard at every ATM. To solve these problems, it is necessary to use technology like mobile banking.

in Lucknow, and given them small loans. Today these artisans have opened factories of their own and are not only self dependent but have also helped keep the Chikan tradition of Lucknow alive.

We have also started an initiative for the last two years where we provide bank accounts to beggars. They are the people in the lowest strata of the society. Our initiative has helped them save a lot of money, thus inculcating ‘saving’ habits among them.

Tell us about the initiatives taken by your bank for financial inclusion.

We have targeted creation of at least 20 mobile banks which will substitute for nearly 100 branches at a much cheaper cost.

Talking again about the Jan Dhan Yojana, they have not included the co-operative sector. The co-operative sector banks are already working for financial inclusion to some extent, but this scheme has left us out. We do not work with big and rich people...we are bankers to the poor. I do not understand why we are given this stepmotherly treatment.

We at HCBL have taken many initiatives towards financial inclusion, one of these is mobile banking. We had modified a van and incorporated it with all the banking fundamentals. It carries all banking facilities like an ATM, opening of accounts, loans etc. This van can substitute the functions of a bank branch. It can go to various places and benefit more and more

Are you planning any new initiative?

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corporate IN PERSON

Shashank Joshi, Managing Director, My Mobile Payments Ltd

Payments Sans Language Barrier We have about 100 million unique users, which is our most significant achievement in the four years of operation...and we aim to double our customers in the coming one year, says Shashank Joshi, in conversation with Kartik Sharma and Nayana Singh of Elets News Netwrok (ENN) What are the new initiatives of My Mobile Payments Ltd? During the first three years, there were a lot of learning experiences for MoneyOnMobile.

Now in the fourth year, we have brought in some changes. We have become the first payments company to have launched multi-lingual websites and multi-lingual App. Other than English, the App is available in nine other languages.

These apps in the nine regional languages have received an overwhelming response from the people. They have witnessed 5000 downloads in a week and have received a rating of 4.4 on Google Playstore. This is one of our latest innovations in MoneyOnMobile.

The competition amongst payments companies has increased manifold with various domestic as well as international players entering the market.

How do you maintain a unique position?

I see this in positive light, as the increase in competition among the people causes an increase in awareness among the people. Our USP from the beginning has been that our product works on all operators. It is not restricted to a few telecom operators, nor is it telecom independent.

The consumers possess multiple phones and use various payments services.

What kind of business opportunity do you see in

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IN PERSON corporate

the newly launched mission of Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana?

In the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, 7.5 crore bank accounts have to be opened by 26th January. Greater the number of accounts, the more will be the beneficiaries to receive remittance, thus increasing the scope for us to provide services to poor people in urban and rural areas to their newly opened bank accounts.

What kind of business opportunities do you see in terms of government payments of subsidies, which are a part of the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana?

Companies like ours are a tool to speed up the process of government payments through MNREGA, Aadhar, DBT, etc. It will also bring down the cost of payments. The payments can be done just by pressing a single button and it involves paperless operations. Government should take advantage of these services.

Some leaders also suggest the

We have become the first payments company to have launched multi-lingual websites and multi-lingual App. Other than English, the App is also available in nine other languages method of alternative payment, independent of bank account transactions. Do you foresee any progress in this domain?

More and more people are becoming aware of mobile payment options; so rather than carrying cash they are carrying money on their mobile phones. There are also talks going on regarding services such as the Bharat Bill Payment Service. So the service providers will have to increase the number of services. The increase in the number of services will increase the use cases for mobile payment.

How are you targeting the population comprising of people below 30s?

In the age group of 16-30, there are probably 300 million users, which is a huge customer base for us. These are the people who are technology friendly, so there are higher chances of them for moving to the kind of products that we have to offer. So we participate in college road shows, we sponsor eco friendly events and campaigns.

Through our digital marketing efforts on facebook and on twitter, we attract these consumers. Also, we have come up with a specific product, designed especially for this customer base. We have enabled My Mobile

as a payment gateway on major e-Commerce sites. So people who do not possess Visa or Mastercard, can buy online and this is the only financial instrument for the unbanked. These products are becoming very popular with the people.

What is your vision for your organisation?

We have about 100 million unique users, which is our most significant achievements in our four years of operation. We want to double our customers in the coming one year. We will add more customers from the rural, semi urban and from the smaller towns. We are not overlooking the metros either. We are working on those areas. Also we partner with media, for their festival campaigns. In Mumbai, we have partnered with DNA for promoting eco friendly Ganesha .We are partnering with the top ten organizers of Durga Puja in West Bengal, whereby, we are setting up stalls where our App in Bengali will be made available.

As one of the prominent players of payments, how do you think you can contribute to the expansion of Financial Inclusion in India?

Once the Payments Bank, which is the proposed to the RBI, becomes a regulation, we are willing to participate in it. Thus, we can reach out to the customer, whom the government wants to include in the program. We can bring fresh customers into the system of financial services.

From which regions do you see a surge in the adoption of My Mobile Payments services?

I think that there will be an increase in adoption of services from all parts of the country. I see business in even the far flung states such as in the North East. We are targeting the Tier II and Tier III cities and we are receiving amazing response from there.

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IN last PERSON mile

Abhishek Pandit, Director (Business Services), AISECT

Empowering the Far-Off AISECT seeks to not only provide skill-based education to those living in remote areas, it also helps in finding gainful employment. In conversation with Sunil Kumar of Elets News Network (ENN), Abhishek Pandit, talks about how the organisation has also become a go-to name for the nationalised banks Please tell us about the solutions/services offered by your organisation?

Our organisation works in a number of areas to uplift the rural and semi-urban masses.

Through a range of product offerings and strategic innovations, including vocational education, higher education, multimedia solutions for K-12 schools, e-governance, financial inclusion, rural recruitment solutions and Government development projects, AISECT has successfully empowered people in the remotest corners of India. AISECT’s core endeavour since its inception in 1985 has been the empowerment of semi-urban and rural population of the country through ICT and skill based education, training and services. Secondly, providing skills training is not going to empower the masses unless the skilled workforce is also

offered gainful employment. Therefore, to assist the placement of the skilled candidates in private and public sector enterprises at the small town, district and block levels, AISECT also caters to the employment needs of the rural population.

Apart from skilling and providing employment opportunities, AISECT also offers B2B, B2C and G2C services like data entry, exam form downloads, selling of insurance policies and collection of premiums, financial inclusion services, selling of telecom and DTH recharge vouchers, railway ticketing, access of land records, payment of taxes, national population register entries, Aadhaar card registration, etc.

All these services are provided keeping in mind the requirements of local community.

What are the services you are providing in financial inclusion domain and in which other states?

AISECT is working as a Business Correspondent (BC) for 26 nationalised banks including the State Bank of India and Bank of India. Under its financial inclusion scheme, AISECT is extending services such as savings, loan facilities,

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account opening, money deposit/withdrawal, and renewal premium collection. Our partnership with establishments like SBI Life and United India Insurance is also helping in imparting insurance services in the unbanked regions of the country. Earlier we were catering to the underprivileged and unbanked population of those districts of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Punjab where AISECT is acting as a Service Centre Agency for the prestigious Common Service Centre (CSC) Project.

Recently, we have extended these services to five more states: Gujarat, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and Bihar. Besides SBI and BOI, the organisation has tied up with Gramin Bank, Indian Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce, Punjab National Bank, Punjab and Sind Bank, all associated banks of SBI, Syndicate Bank, UCO Bank, Union Bank and Vijaya Bank to provide financial inclusion services. AISECT is also working with NPS Lite for Provident Fund services. Additionally, we are also offering PFRDA products, PAN card, insurance services, financial consulting to all these states.

With the increase in microfinance and inclusive banking,

IN PERSON last mile

are you seeing a silent revolution happening in rural India?

We are definitely witnessing a revolution in this sector, as far as unbanked areas are concerned.

Ever since financial inclusion was introduced in our list of offerings, AISECT has been earnestly extending hassle-free savings, loan facilities and other banking services at an affordable cost to the under-privileged and unbanked population of Indian villages. Coupled with Aadhar enabled services, the financial inclusion initiatives by the organisation have brought a massive change in the way services and banking work in rural India. With this revolution, insurance companies and other banking and financial service providers are also reaching out to the masses at a very low unit cost of transaction. We have successfully established about 1500 banking kiosks in rural, semi urban and urban areas and have opened more than 30 lakh bank accounts so far which have done transactions worth `850 crore across the CSC states. In near future, we foresee all the villages to have banking facilities with Kiosk banking or correspondence banking where each of them will be having the facility of interbank transfer.

As you are working as Business Correspondent, how does it help underprivileged and unbanked people where the literacy is also very minimal?

Working as Business Correspondents for 26 nationalised banks, we are bringing the unbanked population into the fold of banking. The best part of working as a Business Correspondent is that the customers need not necessarily be literate. The banking accounts can not only be opened with signatures but also with biometric authentication. All they need to know is why they need to open the account and the advantages of dealing with financial solutions and services. Although financial literacy is not required in this case, we at AISECT are taking a step forward in providing financial literacy programme in the states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh for rural adults especially women as per our partnership with CSC SPV and National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD).

Banks are focusing on mobile banking now. How has been the

In the near future, we foresee all the villages having banking facilities with kiosk banking or correspondence banking, where each of them will be having the facility of interbank transfers

response for mobile banking solutions and kiosks from rural areas?

There has been an encouraging growth of mobile banking in India over the last few years.

However, the growth and acceptance of mobile banking as a channel of accessing banking services in semi urban and rural regions has been below expectation. Although mobile banking allows instant availability of banking and financial services using telecommunication devices, it might take some time for the rural and semiurban population to adapt the culture of mobile banking solutions owing to low levels of user awareness and acceptance. Moreover, as we grow increasingly wireless, there are still many sections in our society especially backward regions that are in a struggle to catch up with it.

People belonging to those regions somewhere turn skeptical of using technological advancements for their banking purposes. Meanwhile, when we talk about kiosk banking, it has picked up leaps and bounds in the last couple of years.

Since it is a fixed asset and consumer can see it every day, it becomes easily accessible for the consumers to go and avail the services every day.

Banks have started to spend on IT infrastructre and virtual banks. How will IT help expand the services in rural areas?

Financial inclusion in India has brought in 10 million “previously unbanked” accounts, enabling a range of products to be offered to these customers. With the introduction of the government’s Aadhaar unique identification system, whereby every citizen has a 12-digit biometric identifier, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) hopes to reduce the role of unauthorised money-lenders in villages and spread financial inclusion through the government’s Direct Benefit Transfer anti-poverty programme. This will create opportunities for savings, credit and remittances, and is expected to be a boom for banks operating in the country. Moreover over the last 29 years, AISECT is banking upon ICT penetration in semi-urban and rural India.

Some of the popular technology models being deployed by AISECT for banking include internet-based kiosk banking solutions, GPRS enabled micro-ATM devices and customer authentication using smart cards and/or biometric fingerprints and/or by UIDAI.

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corporate

Ravi Gupta, Vertical Head, Enterprise & Public Sector, Enterprise Solutions Group, Intel

Helping Masses Decode BFSI Cloud has become omnipresent...irrespective of what we do today on our phones or tablets or desktops, eventually the content is coming from some kind of Cloud — public or private, Ravi Gupta, says in an interview with Souvik Goswami of Elets News Network (ENN)

As the vertical head of an enterprise, what is your main area of operation with regard to the BFSI space?

Our main area of operation in the BFSI domain is banking applications, core banking and branch-level as well as field automation. We operate through a set of verticals focussing on separate segments, like Energy and Utilities, Manufacturing, BFSI, High Performance Computing (HPC), and IT-enabled Services (ITeS). Our team comprises people who have expertise in these different verticals. Essentially they try to make sure that customers are aware of technological advancements taking place in the field of IT and then relate those with their own applications.

What kind of innovations Intel is planning to serve the BFSI sector better?

If we categorise the evolution of technology usage in the BFSI space, it started with back-end automation. Largely, it started with branch-level automation, implying that the first level of customer service could be done by the desktop PCs in a branch without doing any book-level entry. Second phase was the core banking, which comes after the branch level automation in which data is recaptured and analysed by the back end. Intel’s role in this area revolved around servers and server applications which includes large database, ARPs, supply chain, customer response management etc. If we look at it today, that analogy of trans-level automation at desktop and server at the back-end has shifted to tablet as a device and Cloud as an infrastructure.

Looking at BFSI from an evolution point, right now we are at BFSI 3.0, which means customer facing operations are now not necessarily handled by branches. Those can be done by people in street through hand-held solutions. The analysed data does not necessarily go to their data centres, as it could go to a Cloud-based data centre. So, that is the evolution we are witnessing at present. Intel aims to make sure that technological device that we are using for running these applications gives near-PC experience, and secondly, the processing is independent of the customer location.

In this context, what is the role Cloud and big data are playing?

Cloud is becoming omnipresent. Irrespective of what we use today on our phones or tablets, eventually the content is coming from some sort of Cloud — public or private. eGov applications are hosted on a government-based Cloud. Given this environment, most of the companies including banks are now looking at utilising the information sent by your device to know customer preferences. For instance, SBI now offers discounts on select outlets for online and offline purchases to their customers. Every time they make a transaction with their bank’s card, the messages travel to the bank, and it comes to know about their interest places. So, banks get those information

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corporate

not directly from the customers but from their phones.

Similarly, most of the organisations use your phone to find out your location preferences, the route you travel every day, etc. All this information that goes to Cloud eventually has to be analysed in a business-centric manner.

third party Cloud may not be an option for them.

When you talk about Cloud or big data, there are apprehensions in the government agencies. What is Intel’s strategy to dispel those apprehensions?

From government’s viewpoint, every household should have a bank account where they can save money, get interest and transact directly with transparency. From our angle, financial inclusion largely means that the banks have the responsibility of increasing their bank share in rural or urban areas. It should be easy to operate for anybody. On seeing a rupee icon, even an illiterate person should be able to understand how to execute the transaction process. It should be easy and unified across the rural and urban areas. Besides, whatever we do in office base, we should also be able to do on tablet without losing performance, context or connectivity.

Adoption of tablet had been slow in the past largely because one could not use it for every single thing but with Intel coming into tablets

Cloud is a reality today, and the sooner people accept this fact, the better it would be. The apprehensions are largely due to the fact that there could be public sector policies, which today do not allow the data to reside in an undisclosed location. So, largely the workaround is to have private Cloud which most of the public sector banks and public sector organisations are eyeing today. It means their data is omnipresent and they need not be colocated only at Noida or Mumbai.

Public sector policies, however, still need to know where the data is located. For this reason,

For financial inclusion, the government is trying to reach out to the rural base.

How do you think Intel will fit into the scheme of things?

Cloud is a reality and the sooner people adopt it, the better it would be. As of now, overall dependence on infrastructure is too high

with x86 technology, things have become easier, as the same architecture can be used in servers, work stations, laptops and tablets now. So, this is easy for developers and bankers, as they would be able to use their existing apps on phones as well as on tablets.

What do you think are the challenges for Intel in becoming a part of the financial inclusion drive?

On electronic side, e-financial inclusion will not happen unless we have connectivity in all places. For us, connectivity is the enabler.

Service providers like Vodafone, Airtel and others have very similar targets like bankers. For instance, by the end of this year they would provide 2G-3G connectivity to 5 million households. If that happens, it will definitely help in driving e-financial inclusion. BSNL unfortunately does not have the last-mile connectivity everywhere. But it is an opportunity, as we see this challenge as an enabler.

Merging connectivity and content is also important, as when people buy a certain device, we must provide them with not only connectivity but also content, no matter whether that content relates to education, infotainment, banking, financial inclusion or Aadhaar. So, that is the enabler which we are looking forward to work on.

What is your vision for the growth of Intel in the Indian space?

In the Indian space, we have set an ambitious goal for ourselves. Firstly, by the end of this decade, we look forward to Intel becoming part of every medium that can connect people together. That medium can be a phone, tablet or a hearing aid. Starting with technology, we would like to be inside every device that binds the globe together. Our goal is to be part of every space where communication takes place. There are a few differentiators that Intel offers. What Intel brings something more than just a device, as it would be stitched to a solution and optimised to give you a near-PC experience.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

39

corporate IN PERSON

Narayana Menon, Director-Marketing, APAC,

Middle East & North America, Sanovi Technologies Pvt Ltd

Fake Accounts

Cause for Concern Sanovi Technologies Pvt Ltd, the IT service provider to more than 70 percent of the top banks in India, expects the government’s FI programme to give further fillip to its business prospects, says Narayana Menon How can technology be best exploited to effectively execute the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana?

The banking sector in India has experienced a rapid transformation. With the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), the banking sector is all poised to undergo a significant revolution in the financial sector. Technology will certainly play a significant role in helping the government 7.5 crore families open their bank accounts by January 26, 2015. The PMJDY has been conceived as a national mission on financial inclusion with the objective of covering all households in the country under the banking network.

In next few years, the account opening will change in a huge way with various innovations coming into the banking technology space.

Recognising that technology has the potential to address the issues of outreach and credit delivery in rural and remote areas in a viable manner, banks have been advised to make effective use of ICT, to provide doorstep banking services through the Business Correspondents (BCs) model, where the accounts can be operated by even illiterate customers by using biometrics, thus ensuring the security of transactions and enhancing confidence in the banking system.

Moreover: Opening bank

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accounts online could be one major way of speeding up the process to meet the target.

People need not go the banks directly and fill in various forms and submit applications to open a new account. This can be easily done online with the click of a button.

Mobile device capabilities, including cameras and touch screens, can quickly reduce the time required to capture applicant data.

Live Chat – Customers can go in for a live chat with the bank representative for opening a new account. This again cuts the time to a great extent while compared to physically going to a bank.

Big data, security and biometrics will play a huge role in transforming the banking sector in the coming years. Organisations like Sanovi, which are already deeply entrenched in the BFSI space, can be of great help to the banks in this endeavour. Sanovi provides business continuity and IT recovery management to more than 70 percent of the top banks in India.

What are the possible technological, policy-related or other challenges that could impede successful implementation of the programme?

The possibility of fake accounts is one issue that concerns the successful implementation of the PMJDY, as per recent media reports. Some who enrolled under the PMJDY may have accounts elsewhere and could have been persuaded to open new ones because of the attached insurance cover. This could account for about a fifth of the newly opened accounts, top bankers said,

although there’s absolutely no way of knowing for sure yet.

Is there a need for regulatory changes to achieve the objectives of PMJDY? Regulatory changes in some form or the other around micro financing, micro insurance, etc., are imperative. I feel ICT regulations and RBI regulatory and compliance mandates regarding particular projects for banks should be modernised especially in terms of leveraging the Cloud, ensuring service continuity and security as well as end-point devices facilitating banking transactions.

How can the government or banks help in opening up financial inclusion sector to start-ups and bringing in innovations?

I feel that there is already a trend where a lot of start-ups are bringing innovations to the various financial inclusion initiatives. There are at a multitude of influx points. From an IT perspective, the various unconventional approaches that the PMJDY project imbibes as part of the overall financial inclusion agenda gives opportunities to niche players and innovation led enterprises and start-ups to significantly contribute and drive nation building while being profitable. These are of course strictly monitored by the governing bodies regarding quality standards and compliance mandates. Government and banks are directly or indirectly opening up opportunities to innovative product/service providers as part of the larger financial inclusion agenda.

news

Mobile malware tightens its grip in India With mobile penetration in India rising steadily, newer set of online security concerns have emerged. India now ranks fourth in the world when it comes to mobile malware, with Chandigarh topping the list of cities most affected by it within the country.

According to a report released by online security provider F-Secure Labs, a malware called Ransomware is behind majority of such attacks. It demands payment in exchange for unlocking the user’s files.

The research by the company has also identified India as a center for botnets – as bot infecting viruses like Ramnit and Sality are rampant. In the PC malware landscape infections like Trojan, LNK and Conficker (Downadup) are still the highest.

NOFN to spell e-commerce revolution in India: IT Minister Stating that India is on the verge of a digital revolution, which will be similar to the mobile phone revolution that took the country by storm, Union Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has said the National Optic Fibre Network (NOFN) will act as the catalyst to ignite that revolution.

At a meeting with the IT ministers of various states on Aug 26, 2014, Prasad urged the states to bury their hatchets to kick-start the digital revolution for the betterment of the country.

Emphasising the various initiatives under the Digital India programme, the minister stated, “NOFN will lead to an empowered India with village boarding the Internet superway. It will also lead to an explosion of e-commerce in the country.”

The ambitious project worth around `35,000 crore aims to provide high-speed broadband connectivity to 2.50 lakh gram panchayats in India by March 2017.

Govt plans e-visa by October to bolster tourism industry

Modi to track bureaucrats’ attendance through Aadhaar Prime Minister Narendra Modi will now keep track of his bureaucrats through a centralised biometric attendance system linked to Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI)’s Aadhaar project.

Employees will be able to mark their attendance from any central government department by entering a unique six-digit number or their retinal or fingerprint scan through the new system.

The data which will be entered by the staff is likely to be followed by the Prime Minister’s Office on a regular basis.

The attendance software is being developed with the UIDAI team’s assistance. UIDAI is organising special camps at various government buildings to enrol employees who do not have Aadhaar numbers at present. The department of information technology has written to all government departments to register the details of their employees on the portal, www.attendance.gov.in.

The government has planned to come out with e-visa system by the beginning of October to attract a larger number of foreign tourists.

Making this announcement, Union Tourism Minister Sripad Naik recently said that there would be no reservation over the e-visa scheme. Addressing a press conference after a national conference of state tourism ministers in the national capital, he said discussions are going on with all the concerned ministries and that this scheme would be introduced in phases.

As per the plan, the e-visa facility would benefit tourists from all the countries except for the people belonging to Pakistan, Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Sri Lanka, Nigeria and Somalia, Naik added.

Government to go mobile way for eGovernance With a strong 900 million subscriber base, the Government of India has decided to make mobile phones as its first choice for delivering the e-governance services.

The national e-Governance plan, despite receiving budgetary allocation of `1275 crore in 2014-15, is marred by e-literacy, lack of interoperability and last mile access.

“Since mobile devices address the last-mile connectivity, mobile handsets would now be the first choice for delivering e-governance programs”, Rajendra Kumar, Joint Secretary, e-Governance, Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY), stated.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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last mile

Mohammed Riaz, Chief Operating Officer, BASIX Group

Smart Technology TheGameChanger Mohammed Riaz, in conversation with Souvik Goswami of Elets News Network (ENN), says the Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana is the right step in the right direction, though it will be a challenge to make the transition from a cash-oriented economy to a digital economy Give us an overview of the overall operations of BASIX. BASIX is a livelihood promotions institution and was established in 1996. We mainly work with the poor and lower sections of the society. We aim to build capacity and capabilities in them through providing access to various kinds of resources and improve their income level. Now comes the basic question: what do we mean when we say ‘livelihood’? Simply put, it means increase in the income level and reduction of the expenses of the customers.

BASIX has been successfully working for many years in developing it along with a profit model.

All our business models are profitable and we attract mainstream capital and investment into this business. On the other hand, we also focus on attracting best of the human resources as we feel people

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are also very important along with capital. We attract the best of the talent to join us in the process of building inclusive India.

Your organisation mainly works in the rural parts of the country. What kind of challenges do you face when it comes to reaching out to the rural masses?

Inefficiency is one of the main problems which comes to my mind when we talk about working in rural areas. But I also think that problem arises mainly from the lack of proper infrastructure and absence of talent. However, like any other business, I think that once the customer u n d e rst and s prod-

last mile

ucts and services efficiently, it increases its acceptability and it becomes easy to sell. Be it finance, micro finance, skill training or agri extension advice – it all centres around educating customers...this is our way of working.

In our business, we educate our customers by meeting them through various village meetings. Once the customer understands the impact of our work, they become regular users of our various products.

What steps are being taken by your organisation to counter these challenges?

We need to work on rural inefficiencies in terms of distance, productivity or the financial condition of the customers. Keeping in mind all these, we have recruited our staff from the local areas who are working at the grassroots level. This helps us have a better understanding of the entire scenario. Our recruitment strategy

Inclusion Services (FINS), Agricultural/ Business Development Services (Ag/ BDS) and Institutional Development Services (IDS) to rural poor households under one umbrella.

Financial Inclusion Services (FINS) are provided to fulfil working capital and investment needs of the clients – the poor households. It includes savings, credit – short term and long term, insurance for lives and livelihoods, fund transfers, commodity derivatives, financial orchestration – ranging from grants to equity for livelihoods. Agriculture and Business Development Services aim to strengthen the livelihood of the rural poor and women by identifying the sub sectors in which

Inefficiency is one of the main problems which comes to my mind when we talk about working in rural areas. But I also think that problem arises mainly from the lack of proper infrastructure... is based on this model. On the other hand, we recruit best of the talents in the managerial level. We take people for managerial level with the minimum qualification of an MBA. We do that as we believe that prolonged period of education tends to improve the thinking of a person. We also have a livelihood academy in Hyderabad, where these people are trained. This is how we are working to overcome these challenges. On the other hand, we offer wide range of services to our customers and there lies the challenge of providing those services in a seamless manner.

What kind of services do you provide to your customers?

Our strategy is to provide a comprehensive set of livelihood promotion services which include Financial

a significant number of people are engaged and institutionalise the services to work on the gaps identified.

The services include productivity enhancement, mitigating the risks associated, facilitating the Input/Output linkages and value addition to ensure a fair return to the farmer/ customer. Given that the poorest people are isolated and dispersed, it is necessary to organise and strengthen institutions of producers/communities including of the poor and women. This will enable access to livelihood promotion services in a cost- effective and integrated manner, directly or by collaborating with agencies that promote livelihood for a large number of people.

Institution building thus forms an integral part of the BASIX Design & Strategy.

All these services are being provided by a set of 13 compa-

nies under the BASIX group.

The Government of India is giving a huge push to financial inclusion through its Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana. What is your opinion on that?

It is a right step in the right direction. We welcome the steps taken by the new government. Financial Inclusion is a process. The new government has ensured through their execution mechanism to make banks effectively work in this sector. Banks were nationalised in the past to make an Inclusive India. But that work has not been done as desired. However, today, because of the direction of the government, banks are now trying to do it effectively.

I think the challenge will be to encourage the customers to use banks as the medium of their economic activity. In a hugely cash oriented economy like India, challenge will be the transition from cash oriented economy to the digital economy.

How can the challenge of going deep into a country as big as India can be solved?

Only solution to this problem is the more usage of smart technology. We were able to take financial services to the rural India, where there was no electricity, just with the help of smart phones and that too, three years back. Technology can go where even roads can’t reach. But, I don’t agree that technology can deliver on standalone basis. However, technology can reach faster and development can be done along with that.

I have been going to rural India since last ten years and I must say that the government has done a tremendous job in connecting rural India. While more needs to be done, we should also focus on leveraging what has been done already.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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banking

Rahul Modi, Managing Director, Adarsh Credit Cooperative Society Ltd

Hold Back your horses With the chorus for financial inclusion reaching the crescendo, Rahul Modi says the financial system can grow only as fast as the rest of the economy With micro-finance and inclusive banking, are we seeing a silent revolution happening in India?

Microfinance is generally understood as the provision of financial services to low-income households. Majorly, it involves supply of credit, savings, insurance, remittance and pension products or services in token sizes that are much smaller than those prevailing in the mainstream commercial markets.

MFIs in India have borrowed largely, in terms of methodology, processes and systems, from various overseas banks or financial institutions. Most of the leading Indian MFIs started out as NGOs during 1985-1999, and then adopted the model of group-based lending to women in rural areas.

On the other hand, banks have no doubt expanded considerably in the last few decades and more people have been brought into the banking fold. But it has also shown that despite the considerable progress made by the banking sector in the last few decades, there is still a long way to go before one can say that the financial system has become truly inclusive. While the needs of the economy have grown, the response of the banking system has not always been uniform or appropriate across the country. Very often we have seen it being concentrated in a few top cities or metros.

Overall, the microfinance and inclusive banking has grown rapidly, resulting in a bit of silent revolution, but it is yet to satisfactorily market the revolution.

Please give us an overview of the operations of Adarsh Credit Co-operative Society and

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initiatives in the area of financial inclusion?

The organisation started its operations in the year 1999 as a co-operative society primarily catering to the local masses in Rajasthan, majorly occupied in agricultural activities. The organisation has mutual status, which means that we are owned by and run for the benefit of our members. ACCS or Adarsh Credit is India’s leading credit co-operative society in terms of branch network, advisor strength, deposit procurement. The organisation in February 2008 was granted the status of Multistate Co-operative Society

by Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India. As on August 31, 2014, the society has 799

branches across India (except Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Lakshadweep) with a deposit and loan base of `4,421.58 crores and `4,465.46 crores, respectively, and is currently serving more than one million clients across India.

The organisation through its agency model and also with 70 percent of its branches in rural areas has always strived to bring the unbanked people into the ambit of banking arena and thus inculcating the saving habit among them.

To ensure that the goal of inclusiveness is being done on a scalable basis, the organisation is carrying out many of its collections and fund transfer between its members through its mobile money application, enabling everyone to experience the financial services through mobiles and we have been the pioneers

banking

across the co-operative sector in doing so.

In your opinion, what are the broad challenges to Financial Inclusion?

While financial inclusion appears as a noble goal in itself, recent history shows that efforts to drive financial inclusion can be counterproductive unless handled well.

The dangers of reckless credit expansion in the name of financial inclusion should serve as a precautionary tale for policymakers today.

Financial inclusion can be a worthy goal only if it helps reduce poverty levels sustainably.

Given the fact that the roots of poverty often lie outside the realm of finance, making easier access to credit without addressing real economic constraints is unlikely to either boost growth or help fight poverty. Efforts to drive greater financial inclusion can, in fact, end up harming rather than benefiting those in whose name such efforts are launched: the poor and the vulnerable.

Hence, there are no easy short-cuts to financial inclusion. Ambitions for financial inclusion need to be tempered because the financial system can grow only as fast as the rest of the economy. Given India’s income levels, it is not doing either much worse or much better than its peers as far as key parameters of financial inclusion are concerned.

Under the previous UPA government, about 6 crore so-called no-frills accounts were opened last year under its financial inclusion initiative but RBI data has shown that more than half remained dormant, adding up to costs for banks to continue to maintain them.

The Government of India has started “Jan Dhan Yojana”.

What is your opinion about this initiative?

having said that, the necessary strings need to be pulled as and when require to ensure that the initiative is being carried in a true manner and in the best of spirits.

The Government of India’s initiative of Jan Dhan Yojana is basically a drive to speed up the financial inclusion scheme which has been progressing at a snail’s pace in the country.

Insurance cover and over draft benefits certainly seem to be acting as a catalyst. However, there are a few terms and conditions which apply. For instance, to avail an overdraft, the person’s account should be active for at least six months.

Under the previous UPA government, about 6 crore so-called no-frills accounts were opened last year under its financial inclusion initiative but RBI data has shown that more than half remained dormant, adding up to costs for banks to continue to maintain them.

So, to put in a nutshell, the initiative is an exemplary measure to bank the unbanked, however,

How do you think IT can be used for improving efficiency and transparency in functioning?

Technology is enabler for any business. Today, every organisation is leveraging technology to increase more from less by automation of most repeated day to day jobs. The biggest contribution of IT and ICT technology is that it increases the productivity, efficiency and transparency, and brings down the cost of overall operations to deal with competition.

For an organisation like yours, what are the biggest challenges when it comes to IT? As our organisation is primarily focusing on Financial Inclusion, our focus is rural

economy. Biggest challenge that we face is lack of literacy whenever we need to introduce new technology innovation. Recently, we have launched our Agent Banking services where our technology team has provided the platform for our advisors where they can completely get rid of their paper work and reduce their operational burden to increase productivity. It is difficult to change overnight and change is always difficult in an organisation like ours due to our focus on rural area.

We are running lot of campaign to explain them the real benefit of this system and also running some introductory reward scheme to adopt this platform for everyone’s benefit.

In nutshell, we need to put extra effort for increasing awareness and adoption of new technology. Adarsh Credit is making very sincere efforts to increase the financial literacy in rural environment and providing accessibility of financial system at the doorstep with right use of technology.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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corporate

Bhaskar Joshi, Senior Manager-Marketing, Office Imaging Solutions Center, Canon India

First Mover Advantage Even before the present-day clamour for digitisation began, Canon was sitting pretty as a market leader. Now it’s time to expand the canvas. In conversation with Vivek Malik of Elets News Network (ENN), Bhaskar Joshi, talks about how various government initiatives have taken the digitisation drive to the remotest corners of the country Give us an overview of Canon’s Office imaging solutions Division’s operations in India?

We have two kinds of sales structure in this division. First is the direct sales team. This deals with the top 500-1000 large corporates in India. We do direct sales and service to these organisations. It means those on the payrolls of the company directly deal with these companies and provide service to them. Then we have a strong channel partner network. They handle the SMEs and the government sector. We have around 220 channel partners of us.

One unique aspect of our partner network is that it is direct sales and service partnership, meaning whoever sells the machine also services those machines. This is required in any high-level machinery equipment segment. You have to understand that our machine range starts from say, `50,000 and goes onto maybe `20 lakh. So, customer satisfaction becomes very important in such cases. We don’t want our customers to roam in circles contacting the service team or some other third party. That is why the responsibility of service has been given to the seller itself.

Also, we invest a lot of money and time in training these channel partners.

We lay down strict conditions before taking any partner on board. They need to have a minimum number of people working for them, requisite experience and infrastructure. Only then we certify them as partners.

Tell us about your foray into services.

In the traditional model, you sell a product and you have a maintenance agreement. But in services model, we sell it as a service, as in, you don’t have to buy that equipment to use it. It operates on the per-page model, per-click or rental model. We are also offering print management software solutions which deal with the entire data of printing, such as who is printing what and how much.

Same applies for scanning. You can also set a quota for individuals. It works like a pre-paid automatic card. It comes under the services offering. The customer continues to pay on per page basis. Another is ‘any place printing’. Currently, you fire a print and the print comes out from a pre-defined machine. In this

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corporate

system, you fire a print and it will come out when you go near the machine and authenticate your details. And it can be from any machine.

This helps a lot when it comes to confidential documents and other important prints.

We have also launched Canon Business Services. Currently, the usual way of digitalising a document is that you go to a scan machine and start scanning. But the reason you scan a particular document is that you want to secure it for future. In digitisation service, the customer will continue to pay by the per page usage model. We will unbind a particular book or document, scan them, bind them again and also index those pages. It will be integrated with the workflow software as well.

We will also go aggressively on Print Room Services. Today in India, companies outsource of lot of printing which may be brochures, pamphlets or other document needs by the company in large numbers. This is very unorganised in India and has no confidentiality too. We have entered into this arena and will go aggressively into this. The industry is moving into Capex to Opex model.

Digitisation has become a buzzword ever since the new government has come in. A lot of initiatives are being launched.

How do you see yourself in this?

The biggest change has been that earlier we used to run after the people and now it is the other way around. I am talking about the government sector. They are aware of the various initiatives we have launched and want to partner with us.

To focus in a better way, we have initiated state meets with respective state governments. We have started meeting IT secretaries of these states to impress upon the need for digitisation and the services that we offer. We are going pieby-pie such as land records, criminal records. It helps that the Central government has started emphasising on ‘safe city, secure city concept’.

There too a lot of technology is required to secure our cities. So this is our approach when it comes to state governments.

Now that the government sector has realised this, how do you plan to change your approach towards them?

Yes, we are forming a pre-sales team for this sector. Though it will be routed

All the data pertaining to criminal records, fingerprints and other information is being stored in databases and that requires a lot of digitisation. Then there is digitisation of land records in all the states. Same applies to courts across the country through the channel partners only, considering it involves length and breadth of the country and we cannot be present everywhere. This team will do the front ending for all these deals such as explaining about the benefits of a particular machine, closing that deal and then taking the help of event partners in helping them out with services and other aspects. As for the big states for us, they would be Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, West Bengal and the North-East region. We are also keeping a keen watch on Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Punjab.

Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana is a huge project and will bring in a lot of people into the banking fold. This is a huge opportunity for a company like yours. How do you see yourself benefitting from it?

Talking about the banking sector, it involves a lot of paperwork. Earlier, the technology was not playing a big role in it but things have changed now. Also, we want to expand into D and E towns where the impact of this scheme will be seen the most and a lot of unbanked population lives there. The role of our channel partners becomes very important here. Going forward, by 2015, we want to add 50 more partners and they will be exclusively for these towns. We have shortlisted these partners and are currently in the process of training their personnel. We will then go all-out by deploying all our technology there.

What is your take on the

regulatory framework for the sphere you work in?

I will first touch upon the issue of grey imports.

There is a lot of it currently happening. A lot of equipment from the developed world is being dumped on our shores and then after repairs sold in our market. Some law should govern this. This disturbs the level playing field for companies such as ours who invest in technology here. Secondly, is the issue of uniform tax law. All states have different laws and their definition of a particular machine, too, is different.

This needs to be done away with. In a sector like ours even a small difference of tax structure can impact prices in a big way.

How do plan to maintain your lead in the Indian market?

Canon has always been known as a company which brings in new technology. We want to continue that approach. For example, print management solution software is available in India for long but the cost is very high. Because of this SMEs and government sector have not been able to afford it. We want to bring down the costs and make it more affordable. Same features but lower price. Another way of beating the competition is expansion. We want to create a robust service network for our partners.

Currently, we are operating directly in 7 cities and we want to expand it to 10-12 cities. Our market share is 26 percent, which is highest in the country. Going forward we want to increase it to 30 percent by mid next year.

What can people look forward to in terms of technology from Canon in the coming days?

We are coming up with network surveillance camera in coming days which will be a first for India. It will be an IP camera and have features like face recognition and number plate scanning which will be a huge boost as far as surveillance of our cities is concerned.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

47

corporate IN PERSON

Gunjan Sachdev, General Manager &

National Business Head (Toughbook Division), Panasonic India

Mind with muscle With a failure rate of less than 2 percent as against the market rate of up to 25 percent, Panasonic Toughpads are almost a natural choice as a rugged business device, says Gunjan Sachdev, in an interaction with Nirmal Anshu Ranjan of Elets News Network (ENN)

I

n keeping with changing business requirements, Panasonic has come up with Toughpads. The whole body is made of magnesium alloy, and the screen is also equally tough.

Starting with designing, the entire process up to the production stage takes place in the company’s Japan facility.

The best thing about Toughpads is that they are very reliable with a failure rate of less than 2 percent as compared to the market rate of 25 percent. Even if they slip from one’s hand or fall from the table, there is no chance of damage. They are also water, dust and shock-resistant. That makes them perfect for use by those who have to go out of the office for field job like those in manufacturing sector working in some assembly line, or the people in aviation sector, who have to take care of repairing and maintenance work.

They can do lots of things through this device without bothering for it getting damaged.

Packed with features Toughpads come with daylight-readable antireflective display touch screen. They can work in extreme temperatures -- from -30 degree to +60 degree. That is, no matter which part of the country you are in, it works. Despite being a very rugged device, it’s very handy, weighing only 500 gms.

The company has taken special care of the battery life. Many a time, battery recharging facility is not available in the field, so they come with operating battery life of 10 to 16 hours, depending on the battery opted for.

Price of Panasonic Toughpads starts from `85,000. They come with different operating systems – Windows 8 or Android, screen sizes and other customisable devices, which determines the price. What’s more, these Toughpads come with three-year warranty and five years of lifespan. So, it’s complete peace of mind.

Must for ‘safe cities’ Toughpads will supplement the Narendra Modi Government’s initiative to make cities safe and smart. These devices are proving very useful for security surveillance purposes. In fact, we are in talks with various security agencies, including police, who are modernising across the country.

They are giving special thrust to modernising their PCR vans. Previously, they depended on voice-based communications only, but now

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IN PERSON corporate

they are banking more on MDTs (mobile data terminals) like Toughpads, as they carry inbuilt 3G, GPRS and GPS facilities. Using these facilities, they can communicate and send their data to the control room, apart from tracking the location of the PCR vans. It leads to faster crime detection process and in turn better productivity.

Financial inclusion enabler Following acceleration of the process of financial inclusion and e-governance in the country by the incumbent government, a huge demand for such devices is going to arise, as the authorities will need to capture massive data. They will need to go out to far-off places for conducting surveys under adverse conditions, where rugged devices with customised features and long battery life will become a necessity. In fact we are already in talks for several government projects.

One important feature of this product is that it comes with a digitiser – looking similar to a stylus. It can be very helpful for the financial sector involved in the financial inclusion

country prefer it as they have to stay under very unfavourable conditions like rains or scorching heat, and there are chances of it slipping from one’s hand. But, it is built to sustain jerks of falling from four-five feet height.

Plus, in line with their requirement, these devices can work for long hours without having the need to recharge them again and again.

It has also come handy for the power sector maintenance staff. A Toughpad-equipped wind turbine engineer, for example, with fewer tools with him can now serve a larger number of turbines. So, that adds to enhanced productivity, too.

Perfect industrial tool This is a perfect industrial tool. One does not need to move around with two-three similar devices, and numerous converters and connectors. Unlike most other devices, we offer several USB and other customisation ports

Following acceleration of the process of financial inclusion and e-governance in the country by the Narendra Modi Government, there is going to be a huge demand for Toughpad-like devices, as the government and financial institutions needs to capture massive data programme, as one can do on-the-spot digital signatures with its help. You can sign a form, take deposits or issue any kind of digitallysigned receipt instantly by printing using WiFi or Bluetooth facility.

according to the requirement of our clients, like LAN device, bar code reader, RFID, small-large screens, etc. So, instead of using several devices, just one will meet all the requirements.

Biggest consumers

Best in its class

The company has sold about 50,000 units in India, mostly to the railways, defence departments, and survey and automobile sector. We offer them customised devices as per their requirements. In automobile sector, we have sold quite a few to service centres, where vehicles are diagnosed on various parameters through the inbuilt VCI (vehicle connect interface) facility of the Toughpads.

Similarly, survey departments across the

The main competition comes from laptops and computers in the market. But things are changing fast because of both ease of carrying and the incredibly low failure rate. For example, while working in a workshop, the failure rate of a normal tablet of PC can go up to 30 percent.

This leads to not just hidden repair costs, but also productivity losses. So, people are now becoming very clear about their preferences; they want a rugged device which can withstand

heat, dust, water, etc. without having to spend every now and then on their repair.

India experience Panasonic is a household name in India. So acceptability is not an issue. But customs duty is very high in India, which adds to the cost of the product. If you go to other AsiaPac regions, there is no duty or negligible. However, we are confident about our sale figures here, as the customers have started understanding the benefits of niche devices. That is why, be it government departments, private sector or public sector undertakings, all are accepting our products well, thus pushing the sales growth to 70 percent, year-on-year.

Awareness challenge Awareness among people is a big challenge while launching an innovative product. And, same is the case with Toughpads...awareness about these products is very less. Since it’s a very innovative and specialised product, people need to be informed. So, we hold do lots of exhibitions and seminars, and participate in industry-vertical exhibitions where we showcase our products. We recently participated in an Interpol expo, an auto exhibit in Pune and a survey-focussed event. The pace at which we are reaching out to our prospective clients should be able to give us 60-70 percent of the Indian market share very soon, as elsewhere on the globe.

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policy

Rajagopal Devara, Secretary-Cooperation, Marketing & Textiles Department, Government of Maharashtra

‘ICT helped dump redundant processes’ His department has surely come a long way as far as implementation of ICT is concerned, but Rajagopal Devara believes there is still a long way to go

The potential of ICT has been greatly explored by the Co-operation Department. Take us through the approach adopted to explore these technologies.

To shell out a few numbers, our department reaches out to 2.23 lakh cooperative societies. They, in turn, cater to the need of 647 lakh members. Cooperative movement is more than 100 years old in Maharashtra, but for the last 2-3 years, considerable IT-centric operational reforms are being implemented within and outside the department.

Starting with crowd-sourcing, it is a very innovative concept these days and has become a mega-trend as many business giants like Facebook, Apple and Amazon etc., are using it. We, too, instrumentally used the crowdsourcing concept in our department for effective governance. Our administration used to collect huge data from fields and manage it manually, which used to consume the efforts of our field staff. We outsourced it to our stakeholders like co-operative societies, auditors, etc., and provided an electronic platform where the society and auditors could create online accounts. We also provided an online account for our Registrar to manage the societies online. Today, we have an online database of 1.83 lakh co-operative societies. This has also helped us in weeding out the dormant or inactive cooperative societies. Today, any department can view the co-operative society profile of any district, taluka or village online.

Currently, we have about 7,600 auditors whose entire profiles are available on our website for all co-operative societies.

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One of your department’s key successful initiatives has been ‘Deemed Conveyance’. We would like to know about the operational success achieved through this initiative.

In the system that was prevalent there, concerned parties had to go through multiple hearings with three departments, i.e. land records, Registrar of Stamps and Co-operation Department. Our department came up with an application so that housing co-operative societies could apply, track progress and download hearing orders online. We have also provided applicants with payment gateway for online payments.

Now, our officers review the applications online and manage the cases there itself. It has resulted in shortening the lifespan of such cases as hearing mostly used to get deferred due to non-availability and accessibility of case orders, case documents. This technically-empowered process has helped in faster decision-making and achieving productive and accurate conclusions.

What all changes such initiatives have brought in when it comes to leveraging the success of the department’s functions?

KPMG has prepared an e-Governance roadmap for us by which we have identified key processes for digitisation. By implementing this roadmap, we have saved almost 5 man-month efforts per office (more than 700 offices) and the consequent cost savings have been considerable. To cite an example, we used to earlier send notices to co-operative societies or auditors physically for any non-compliance. Today, we can send SMSs to Chairmen and Secretaries of selected societies through the SMS gateway.

Technical assistance has also elevated efficiency in the monitoring and auditing process by making the system more effective, transparent and productive. The department has been receiving a positive response from the users and co-operative societies through these initiatives.

Technology has transformed the way the department used to function. Today, we have eliminated redundant processes which involved manual intervention. Paper-based processes and multiple human touch points led to poor data collection over which critical business decisions were made by our field officers.

Today, real time information is available online

round the clock on our website, thus ensuring availability of a single version of data to our hierarchy. The services have also evidently contributed in curbing fallacies like red-tapism and involvement of middle-men in processes like deemed conveyance. The department aims to further leverage the potential of IT and ICT. Developing and establishing Open Data Bank and State Data Bank with the support of the Department of Information Technology are a few such initiatives.

You must have faced a few obstacles while implementing such initiatives, and what were the strategies adopted by your department for overcoming them?

The key challenges were awareness among stakeholders and capacity building of our resources up to the Taluka level. To make stakeholders aware, we used local newspapers and websites in order to reach out to them.

Awareness about new processes was addressed by providing technical support through social media and a dedicated citizen-centric call centre. Capacity building was carried out at each division and district level by the KPMG team. Our officers were trained during the training programme and supporting documents like user manuals are also provided to them for ready use in bilingual format. We have also provided a dedicated video conferencing setup extended by the DIT up to district level.

Our prime challenge even today is the lack of IT infrastructure in our department. We have an acute shortage of computers at our field offices. Many offices are using available PCs on sharing basis. As per our IT assessment, we urgently need more than 2,000 PCs with connectivity. We need to immediately attend to the same as our key e-governance systems are in place.

How has been your experience in rolling out ICT-based application in this domain?

Co-operative societies in the state are scattered all over, hence a major focus was to achieve up-to-date data on the exact number of societies located in the untapped regions. Ensuring qualitative approach was the other prime focus area for which the department undertook a ‘three-key focused’ mode. This included establishing a democratic, transparent and effective platform for co-operative societies, compilation of all the essential data on up-to-date basis about all the co-operative societies, educating the co-operative societies and creating qualitative awareness about the services available.

Use of information technology has evidently supported in creating a vibrant, informative and effective platform. It has helped the department focus on the e-Governance roadmap and its implementation. Today, all the departmental activities are being operated through crowdsourcing platforms, wherein real-time data has evolved in a qualitative manner.

October 2014 / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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policy

K P Bakshi, Development Commissioner (Planning) and Additional Chief Secretary,

Government of Maharashtra

Tech dynamics Change Way too Fast We need to have a mechanism through which qualified IT personnel should take up government employment, K P Bakshi, tells Elets News Network (ENN) How does information technology help you in getting the work done faster?

I look after the main programmes as well as the entire planning of the state. The focus area of my work is MPLADS (Member of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme). As you know, under the scheme, each MP has the choice to suggest to the District Collector works to the tune of Rs 5 crore per annum to be taken up in his/her constituency.

The department has set clear guidelines on scheme, concept, implementation and monitoring. It has initiated all necessary steps to ensure that the scheme is successfully implemented in the field. The progress of the works being implemented under the scheme is monitored on a regular basis.

To do all such work, we have software that helps in deciding what activities should be taken up and what not. To cite an example, at the lower levels, sometimes there is demand for a work which is not admissible. It becomes very difficult for the local level functionaries to decide whether the work should be taken up or not. But with the help of the software, we immediately accept or reject the proposal. Some works which are not allowed by the state governments can be immediately decided by the functionary. This is a completely automated system through which we use IT to monitor MPLADS.

Please share with us a brief about the initiatives implemented and user feedback towards the services.

We are involved with state level planning and do not get involved in execution or lower level monitoring, as it is done by respective departments. We allocate funds and generally coordinate between various secretaries to take some of the developmental activities forward; supervising from a broader perspective only. Here, the entire policy making, advising various departments in making cabinet notes, approving or giving our consent for the cabinet notes, which go to the cabinet for decision, everything is done by us. So, there is not much of IT being used in that field.

What all problems do you face in implementation of IT and how do you counter them?

One of the major hurdles is the rapidly changing dynamics of the technology in a short span of time. While technology is changing rapidly, the government procedure in appointment of a consultant, fixing up a panel of consultant is a time-taking process.

By the time they are ready with the panel of consultants the technology has changed and there is no use of consultants.

At the time of appointing a consultant, he will be completely updated about the latest technology, but by the time the government is done fixing up his contracts,

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policy

the technology moves ahead and thus the appointed consultant is found to be inadequate. This is one issue that needs attention and solution. Also, procurement of hardware or all IT related initiatives also poses a problem because this is a time-taking procedure and too faces a similar problem.

There again, changes in technology and lack of clarity in specifications, these are the things that come in the way. For example, Mumbai is proposed to be linked with 6000 surveillance cameras. At the time of deciding upon the specifications of CCTV cameras, IT department and user department (Police dept.) would give two different set of opinions.

Arriving on a unanimous decision takes a long

the potential of information technology?

As I mentioned, MRSAC (Maharashtra Remote Sensing Applications Centre) is involved in mapping and monitoring of natural resources for their better management.

MRSAC also offers benefits of Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System (GIS) technology. The centre has promoted this technology to government departments and academic institutions for various applications in areas like soil and water conservation, ground water potential, forest and biodiversity studies, crop acreage estimation, watershed development and monitoring, urban development, etc.

Apart from the applications, MRSAC provides

But the problem that we face is of our own recruitment system where qualifications are not updated. Even if the present setup allows us to recruit highly qualified people, we do not have the system of recruiting those qualified people in the government setup. time and when it happens the technology has been replaced by a newer one in the market with altogether different set of specification.

This project with an investment of hundreds of crores has been on hold due to these reasons.

This is just one example as similar problems can be found with small and big projects around the country.

What are the initiatives in the pipeline for further exploring

software solutions in Geo-spatial domain and has developed information / decision support systems. With the sound foundation of multi-scale databases and its Web Geo-portal MRSAC is committed to help the state to achieve e-Governance.

Keeping these benefits in mind I requested the government to open units of MRSAC and they agreed, so, we now have one unit each in Mumbai and Pune. Earlier, MRSAC was based in Nagpur only. Thus there are three units of

MRSAC in Maharashtra and all these three units are covering the respective areas and respective departments.

Regarding the use of eGovernance, how do you plan to use it in enhancing the functionality of the department?

It goes without saying that e-governance has a tremendous scope in public administration and government activities. But the hurdle that we face is of our own recruitment system where qualifications are not updated. Even if the present setup allows us to recruit highly qualified people, we do not have the system of recruiting those qualified people in the govern-

ment setup. And unless they recruit updated IT qualified people, they won’t be able to take e-governance forward.

Therefore, the eligibility criteria for recruitment need to be changed. The government should make IT knowledge a compulsory requirement at the entry level so that everybody has some basic knowledge of IT. Every employee must be exposed to IT as then only they can take up IT initiatives and e-governance at a larger scale. As of now, we have started to implement it but still, a lot needs to be done.

In this scenario, IT departments have set an example as they have the best consultants in their unit. It has helped them to take up e-governance projects. If similar practice is extended to other departments and if we allow them to have technically qualified people then they too can be in sync with the current developments.

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Movements IN PERSON

Movements Subhash C Garg appointed Executive Director, World Bank Subhash Chandra Garg has been appointed as Executive Director in World Bank. Garg, a 1983-batch IAS officer of Rajasthan cadre, will have tenure of three years from the date of assuming charge of the post.

Garg is presently serving in Rajasthan. The Appointments Committee of Cabinet (ACC) had last month approved the proposal for extension of tenure of M N Prasad, a 1972 batch IAS officer of Bihar cadre (retired), as Executive Director, World Bank till October 31. The order for Prasad’s appointment was issued on July 26, 2011 for three years. Prasad was then working as Secretary to former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

I C P Keshari appointed Principal Secy, Energy Dept, MP I C P Keshari has been appointed as Principal Secretary, Energy Department in Madhya Pradesh. He is a 1988 batch IAS officer of MP cadre. Keshari has been Joint Secretary Power in the Government of India prior to his return to the parent cadre.

S K Srivastava appointed Chairman, Delhi Financial Corp.

S K Srivastava has been appointed as Chairman, Delhi Financial Corporation in Delhi Government. Srivastava is a 1980 batch IAS officer of AGMUT cadre.

O P Singh appointed Head, NDRF O P Singh, currently serving as ADG in CISF, has been appointed head of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF). Singh is 1983 batch IPS officer of UP cadre.

A S N Murthy appointed as CVO, HSL A S N Murthy has been appointed as Chief Vigilance Officer (CVO) in Hindustan Shipyard Limited (HSL), Visakhapatnam. He is a 1992 batch IPS Officer of Karnataka cadre.

Sunil Arora appointed Secretary, Skill Development Sunil Arora, 1980 batch IAS officer of Rajasthan cadre and former CMD of Indian Airlines, has been appointed as Secretary in the newly created Department of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship under Ministry of Skill Development, Entrepreneurship, Youth Affairs and Sports.

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G M Kumar is new Defence Production Secretary G Mohan Kumar, a 1979 batch IAS officer of Odisha cadre, has been appointed as Secretary in the Department of Defence Production. Kumar replaces G C Pati, a 1978 batch IAS officer of Odisha cadre, who will be the new Odisha’s Chief Secretary.

A Lavasa is new Secretary, Ministry of Environment and Forests Ashok Lavasa, currently serving as the Secretary in Civil Aviation, has been appointed as the Secretary in the Ministry of Environment and Forests, thus replacing V Rajagopalan, a 1978 batch IAS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre. Lavasa is a 1980 batch IAS officer of Haryana cadre.

Rakesh Singh appointed as Steel Secretary Rakesh Singh, 1978 batch IAS officer of Punjab cadre, has been appointed as new Steel Secretary. Singh, who is working in Punjab, will take over the charge of Steel Secretary from G Mohan Kumar (a 1979 batch IAS officer of Odisha cadre), who has been appointed as Secretary, Department of Defence Production.

V Somasundaran is new Secretary, Civil Aviation V Somasundaran, 1979 batch IAS officer of Kerala cadre, has been appointed as the new Civil Aviation Secretary. Somasundaran, who is serving in Kerala, will take over the charge from Ashok Lavasa, who has been appointed Secretary in Ministry of Environment and Forests.

Amit Khare appointed Member Secretary, NPPA Amit Khare, an IAS officer of the 1985 batch from the Jharkhand cadre, takes over as Member Secretary, National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA), under Department of Pharmaceuticals.

R N Ravi is new JIC Chairman R N Ravi, former Intelligence Bureau Special Director, has been appointed as the Chairman of Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) for a period of three years. Ravi, a 1976batch Indian Police Service officer from Kerala, has been appointed in the pay and rank of Secretary to the Government of India. He retired as IB Special Director in 2012.

Dr Ravi Gupta, CEO, Elets Technomedia Pvt. Ltd., felicitating Shri Narendra Modi at eINDIa 2011 Gandhinagar, Gujarat

The 10th annual eIndia event is being held on 14-16 November 2014 at The Leela Hotel, Kovalam, Kerala.

The event will have four key themes - eGovernance, eHealth, eEducation and Financial Inclusion.

It will see a gathering of top decision makers from the government and industry who will discuss the ICT implementation strategy in the government sector.

INCLUSION SUMMIT