Interventions to Strengthen PMJDY Scheme

Launched in August 2014 by the Prime Minister of India, Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) is now the world’s most successful financial inclusion scheme to provide access to savings accounts, credit, remittance, insurance and pensions, to the financially excluded of India.

MicroSave conducted three rounds of assessments of PMJDY scheme between October 2014 and December 2015. The detailed analysis of data on Bank Mitras (BMs) and PMJDY customers revealed bottlenecks prevalent in PMJDY scheme at both policy and operational levels.

This Focus Note presents key policy and operational interventions that need to be addressed to improve the overall scheme effectiveness, enhance the usage of PMJDY accounts and improve the sustainability of the BM channel. The recommendations are divided into policy-level interventions and operational solutions for fixing bottlenecks.