Set up RBI office in Arunachal for financial inclusion: Khandu

Itanagar, May 15 (IANS) Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Monday wrote to Reserve Bank of India Governor Urjit Patel to set up its office here in this frontier state in order to have close regulatory oversight of Public and Private Sector Banks to meet the goal of financial inclusion.

"Arunachal Pradesh is a strategically important state and the geographical remoteness of the place is further aggravated by the fact that in several parts of the state, there is poor road and telecom connectivity," Khandu stated in his letter.

"The rural habitations with sparse population make banking extremely difficult. I would like to underscore that there are only 182 bank branches in the state and only 223 ATMs in the whole state, mostly concentrated in the district headquarters," he added.

"Unfortunately most of the banks are reluctant to move beyond urban settlements and there is a very limited response to Common Service Centres (CSCs), given the low volumes of transaction," the Chief Minister stated.

Khandu said that a RBI office at the state capital would go a long way in strengthening the financial institutions and also streamlining other financial transactions in the State.

He called for an aggressive approach to maximise the reach of bank services to far-flung remote areas to make Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of cashless transaction a cent per cent success.

Khandu further suggested that to make banking viable, it would be appropriate for the RBI to devise a specific scheme to meet the operating expenses of banks and CSPs in the North Eastern Region, especially for the remote parts of Arunachal Pradesh.