Bhubaneswar: In the last few years India took several important steps towards becoming a digital economy. Online payments via mobile phones, credit and debit cards and internet banking have risen sharply. The government, through different initiatives has been pushing all its citizens towards digital payments in order to make India a less-cash economy. The main reason for these developments is to curb corruption and make transactions hassle free. The government too has linked payments for various government schemes to peoples bank accounts directly to ensure benefits reach the farmers and poor in full. Jan Dhan bank accounts couples with Aadhaar linking is helping the government achieve this goal.

But this aim of digital transactions to curb corruption and ensure transparency can only be achieved when the citizens living in the remotest corners of India are able to carry out these transactions. For this to happen, many mobile banking services, payment wallets (through UPI),  and public sector banks are doing their bit to promote digital payments.

In a recent one, a Odisha branch of State Bank of India has adopted a remote village to familiarize residents on how to make cashless transactions and digital payments.

The details are that the SBI’s Kalinga Nagar branch had adopted Bhagabanpur village in Odisha and is trying to help each resident living in the village to understand digital and mobile banking systems better.

“Keeping Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of a less-cash economy, the bank decided to take this initiative at Bhagabanpur to help all residents of the village transact digitally,” an official said.

In their first such initiative, the SBI distributed Android phones with a USB bashed ‘fingerprint swipe’ device to the shopkeepers in the village and helped them and also the customers transact digitally.

Speaking with news agency, State Bank of India official Praveena Kala said, “The initiative is aimed at empowering the people.” Initiatives like these, she said, would also help bridge the urban-rural gap, and help villagers keep up with the technologies of today.

“We have issued mobile phones and Aadhaar-enabled machines to 20 shopkeepers in the village. So anybody who has a bank account with SBI or any other bank and has linked their Aadhaar number to it, they can just come to the shop and make a payment by simply swiping their thumb.” Ms Kala said.