Jharkhand: Sept 15 deadline to link bank accounts with Aadhaar

Jharkhand set a deadline of September 15 for linking Aadhar numbers to bank accounts of beneficiaries to ensure transfer of cash benefits relating to government schemes such as LPG subsidy, scholarships and pension, officials said on Friday.

The Aadhaar-linked accounts will be mapped by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) – an umbrella organisation for all retail payments that will enable people to have access to e-payment services.

After the mapping, the state aims to become the first state in India to get fully linked with Public Financial Management System (PFMS) – a central online monitoring portal for all central schemes with direct benefit transfer (DBT) facility, officials said.

The Modi government set a December 30 deadline for national rollout of PFMS.

“We want to get fully linked with the PFMS portal ahead of all other states – by September 30 against the Central deadline of December 30. After September 30, DBT money can’t be sent to beneficiary accounts without Aadhar seeding and NCPI mapping. Hence, we’ve set the September 15 deadline,” Amit Khare, state additional chief secretary (finance and planning), told HT.

“We are on course and hope to accomplish Aadhaar seeding and NPCI mapping of beneficiary accounts under MNREGA, social security schemes like pensions, public distribution system (PDS), students’ scholarships and direct benefit transfer of LPG (DBTL).”

Jharkhand ranked first in the country on the Centre’s Apna Dhan services and e-district project under the Digital India Mission. The state recorded 25 lakh transactions under the e-district project followed by Chhattisgarh with 2 lakh and Haryana with 90,000 till May this year.

Shifting of MNREGA wage accounts of workers to banks with core banking services (CBS) from post offices is a bottleneck to the state’s target of becoming the first to be linked with PFMS portal.

“Out of 27.53 lakh registered MNREGA workers in the state, 25.95 lakh wage accounts have Aadhar cards. Only 17.16 lakh of them have bank accounts and have been Aadhar seeded,” Khare said.

According to state finance department records, Aadhar numbers of 52.27 lakh of 58.40 lakh PDS beneficiaries have been seeded with bank accounts in the state -- 90% against national average of 60.8%. As for DBTL, 16.41 lakh bank accounts out of 19.64 beneficiaries have been linked to Aadhar.