Govt asks banks to enable m-banking for all by March 31

New Delhi: The government has instructed banks to link all savings accounts with mobile and Aadhaar numbers by March 31, 2017, and enable mobile banking for such customers.

All banks have been advised to undertake this in campaign mode, an official statement on Friday said.

Mobile number seeding and enabling the same for m-banking are a pre-requisite for making mobile payments while Aadhaar number seeding is a pre-requisite for using Aadhaar Enabled Payments System (AEPS), it added.

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), according to a recent Cabinet Secretariat notification, has been given the responsibility of promotion of digital transactions, including digital payments.

As per an estimate, currently only 65 per cent saving accounts are seeded with mobile numbers and only 50 per cent with Aadhaar.

Out of the 65 per cent accounts already seeded with mobile numbers, only 20 per cent are enabled for mobile banking.

"To make this process convenient to customers, MeitY has advised the banks to explore 'Over the Air' customer consent instead of requiring customers to visit the bank branch or ATM as is required currently," the statement said.

The campaign is to be launched with immediate effect.

The progress of seeding and mobile bank enabling will be monitored by MeitY along with the Department of Financial Services.

Banks will have to give adequate publicity in national, regional and local media, besides conducting camps for on-the-spot seeding of bank accounts.

Also, they have been advised to utilise their extensive branch network as well as banking mitras or correspondents to carry out an effective outreach programme, especially in rural areas.

The process of enabling bank accounts for mobile and Aadhaar based banking is completely voluntary.

"However, given the benefits of these banking channels, a large number of customers are expected to opt for it," it said.

Accordingly, banks have been advised to be prepared with adequate infrastructure to facilitate this process effectively with no inconvenience to customers.