Lakshwadeep tops Jan Dhan account rich list; J&K reports 357% rise in average balance since 2017

Lakshadweep and Goa have highest average account balance

The average balance in Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) accounts has nearly doubled over the last seven years to Rs 4,352 in August, as compared to Rs 2,254 seven years ago.

A Moneycontrol analysis shows that some states have reported far greater gains than others.

Uneven gains?

For instance, the erstwhile state of Jammu Kashmir, including Ladakh, has reported a 357 per cent rise in average balance during this period. The average balance has increased to Rs 6,616 per account from Rs 1,446 over the past seven years.

Chhattisgarh has accounted for a 197 per cent rise in average balance to Rs 4,251 from Rs 1,432 in 2017.

Though the union territory (UT) of  Lakshadweep and the country’s smallest state, Goa, may not have reported an appreciable uptick, they top the country in terms of average money per account.

Lakshadweep is the only state or UT, where an account balance is over Rs 10,000 on an average, a rise of 65 per cent since 2017 at Rs 18,213.

Similarly, data showed that Goa’s average account balance is Rs 8,314 in August.

On the contrary, the northeastern states such as Manipur and Tripura are worse off, where the average balance is lower than a decade ago. Assam, the most populous northeastern state, brings up the rear at Rs 2,655.

Assam and Punjab have reported the worst growth among all the 28 states, with average account balance rising by 29 and 10 per cent respectively, over the last seven years.

Haryana, which is one of the leading states as far as Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) schemes are concerned, has the highest average account balance at Rs 6,320. Haryana runs 154 DBT schemes and has transferred Rs 83,471.8 crore in accounts since the inception of the scheme on August 28, 2014.  In contrast, Punjab runs fewer DBT programmes at 114 and has transferred Rs 48,863 cumulatively till date.

The government has added 53.1 crore PMJDY accounts and deposited over Rs 2.31 lakh crore in them since the scheme’s launch.

In an exclusive interview with Moneycontrol, M. Nagaraju, secretary, department of financial services, had noted that the scheme is near saturation across all states and UTs.  The government is looking to expand the scope of the scheme to track digital footprint of accounts in a bid to offer additional products and services to its beneficiaries.