PAYMENT BANKS: FULCRUM FOR LESS CASHLESS ECONOMY AS WELL AS FOR FINANCIAL INCLUSION

The evolving economic landscape and fancies of the people have driven the government to plan seamlessly for inclusive banking for realising the opportunities that lie within. 21% chunk of Indian population are unbanked according to World Bank Report. Reckoning the long outstanding need for reaching out to the far-flung non-banked areas of the country, the central bank of India introduced more competition among banks by authorising, in principle, a kind of bank. On 19th Aug 2015, the RBI announced eleven approvals for payment banks. Payment bank concentrates their activities at farmers, migrants' labours, low income households, vendors, small businesses and unorganised sector of the society. These banks offer banking facilities such as payments, deposits, remittances, internet banking but cannot undertake lending activities. This paper attempts to investigate that how payment banks going to benefit the Indian economy for its cashless initiative and bank the unbanked chunk of Indian population