Mysuru: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) at Talkatora Stadium in New Delhi at 2.30 pm today. The launch will be simultaneous across the nation and an event has been organised in Mysuru at Leela Chennaiah Convention Hall on Valmiki Road.

The IPPB will have 650 branches and 3,250 access points spread across the country.

The facility will also be inaugurated at five post offices in Mysuru including Ittigegud, Head Post Office, Chamundi Hill, Postal Training Centre (PTC) and Duddagere.

Mysuru District Lead Bank Chief Manager Venkatachalapathi will be the chief guest at the event in city and the guests of honour will be All India Radio Assistant Director (Programmes) H. Srinivas and New Maharani’s Commerce and Management College Post-Graduate Department of Commerce Co-ordinator Dr. S. Manju.

According to a statement from the Central Government, it aims to link all 1.55 lakh post offices to IPPB by Dec. 31 of this year.

IPPB highlights

The aim is to implement last mile connectivity to the common man especially in rural areas where the banking penetration is almost nil. The advantage of India Post is that it has a rural penetration of 1,30,000 access points (Post Offices), which is nearly 2.5 times the number of bank branches in rural India today.

The service will be provided to the account holder by the postman who carries the swipe card where the customer can swipe it with the biometric thumb impression.

Banking simple

“IPPB will make banking and payments simple. Using Aadhaar card it will open paperless accounts in minutes and hence there is no need for passbooks and challans. It will allow customers to make digital transactions with the help of QR (Quick Response) cards and biometric authentication,” said Senior Superintendent of Post Offices N. Prakash speaking to Star of Mysore, this morning.

IPPB banking will help in social security schemes like pensions (which includes all Central and State Government schemes like Sandhya Suraksha, old age pensions, physically challenged and other ones), gas subsidies, National Rural Employment Guarantee Act payments, crop compensation to name a few, he said.

There is a large network of more than three lakh postmen and Gramin Dak Sevaks (GDS) offering Assisted Doorstep banking in rural, urban and remote areas, he said and for IPPB the last-mile service partner is the postman, he added.

Cash-less economy

Asked what the main aim of IPPB was, he said that it was to build the most accessible, affordable and trusted bank for the common man and to spearhead the financial inclusion agenda by removing the barriers for the un-banked and the under-banked population.

“India has traditionally been a cash-dominated economy. In order to evolve as a digital economy it is critical to have points of presence where cash can be converted to digital money. This in turn will create transparency, removes corruption and leakages by removing cash from the system, enabling a less cash economy and thus contributes to India’s GDP. Moreover as the Department of Posts has a huge network, it will enable the digital economy,” said Prakash.

IPPB will offer a range of products such as savings and current accounts, remittances and money transfer, direct benefit transfers, bill and utility payments and enterprise and merchant payments.