NEW DELHI: India Post has become
the third entity to receive a final license last week from the Central Bank to
start its payment bank operations. Country’s largest telcom service provider
Bharti Airtel and digital payments firm Paytm are the other two to have
received the license while only Airtel has started operations so far.
The government has also appointed
AP Singh has interim MD and CEO of the India Post Payment Bank. A 1986 Indian
Postal Service Officer he was earlier Joint Secretary in the department of
disinvestment, ministry of Finance and Deputy Director General incharge of
financial inclusion and payments systems at Unique Identification Authority of
India (UIDAI). Singh was one part of the founding team that launched Aadhaar
and was stationed at the department of Post prior to UIDAI.
As per the initial road map, each
post office in the country will offer the post bank services. The department of
post has an existing network of around 1,55,000 post offices currently. ET had
reported earlier that IndiaPost plans to open 650 new branches for the payment
bank. The branches will be co-located with the existing post offices. The idea
is that the 650 branches will be in located in postal district headquarters and
all the branches under that particular head post office will be enabled by the
payment bank services. This will cover the entire network of 155,000 post
offices in the country.
Earlier this month, Airtel Payments
Bank launched nationwide operations, offering 7.25% interest on savings bank
balances, which is more than the maximum 7% paid by SBI on its fixed deposits.
Bharti and Kotak Mahindra, which holds a 20% stake in the payments bank, would
invest Rs 3,000 crore in the venture.
Payments banks can accept
deposits from individuals and small businesses of up to Rs 1 lakh per account.
And RBI had set a condition that formal license has to be obtained before 31
March.
Alibaba backed Paytm also said
early in January that it has received the final license from RBI and the
company hopes to launch operations in February with the first branch coming up
in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.
While operation of Payment Banks
such as Paytm are likely to be focused on technology based differentiation,
IndiaPost is banking on its huge reach especially in the rural areas to be
successful.