Prasad has asked Department of Posts to hasten process of setting up all 650 payments bank branches by September 2017.
Telecom
Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad Thursday asked Department of Posts to
hasten process of setting up all 650 payments bank branches by September
2017.
"Minister
(Prasad) today met Postal Services Board for India Post Payments Bank
and asked them to expedite the process of setting up this entity by
September 2017 as desired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. There will be
about 3.5 lakh employees who are being trained in phases," an official
source told PTI.
The
Union Cabinet on Wednesday cleared proposal to set up India Post
Payments Bank with a corpus of Rs 800 crore and has plans to have 650
branches operational by September 2017. It will be expanded further
scaled up to cover the entire country by the end of financial year
2018-19.
Earlier, the Department of Posts (DoP) had to set-up 650 IPPB branches in three years.
With
advancement of target, DoP will set up 50 branches by March, 125 by
April, 200 in May, 300 in June, 400 in July, 525 in August and 650 by
September.
"The Minister (Prasad) will hold review meetings every fortnight," the source said.
Initially most of the 3.5 lakh workforce will be posted on deputation who will be gradually replaced by fresh recruits.
Prasad
has asked postal department to hire MD and CEO of the IPPB by August and
set up selection committee for hiring Chief Financial Officer by June
15.
The minister has also advance dates for giving handheld devices to 1.3 lakh grameen dak sevaks.
"He has
asked the Department of Posts to start rolling out handheld devices in
from June 15 and finish the process by in next 3-4 months," the source
said.
The
IPPB will be managed professionally and most of its A grade employees
will be hired from market. The IPPB board will have representation from
various other government departments including the Department of Posts,
Department of Expenditure, Department of Economic Services etc.
Government has approved Rs 800 crore corpus for IPPB which will have Rs 400 crore equity and Rs 400 crore grant.
