ESAF Bank launches 'rainbow account' for transgender community

(Image: Reuters)

ESAF Small Finance Bank Ltd on Tuesday launched a ’Rainbow Savings Account’ exclusively for the transgender community offering a host of features, including high savings rate and advanced debit card facilities.

A trans-friendly or inclusive labour culture is the need of the hour and this is a big step towards the inclusive revolution, Kerala-based ESAF Small Finance Bank said in a statement.

The Reserve Bank of India in 2015 directed banks to include a separate column ’third gender’ in all their forms and applications. ESAF Bank has a history of more than 25 years of primarily serving the unserved and underserved, with a focus on financial inclusion and its vision is to be India’s leading social bank, that offers equal opportunities through universal financial access and inclusion of livelihood and economic development, the bank’s managing director K Paul Thomas said.

The ’Rainbow Savings Account’ scheme comes with a high-interest rate and advanced debit card facilities, he said. Also, he said, default credit of interest to the account is another attractive feature of the scheme.

Many transgenders from different parts of Kerala participated in the launch of Rainbow Savings Account’s logo event, which was organised in association with Navodaya Movement. The savings habit of the marginalised community will contribute heavily to the growth of the economy as a whole, Thomas said.