Under the Digital India vision of Central Government, the SBI has introduced Digital Village, where the Bank is seeking to extend its technology aided services to the upwardly mobile and keen rural youth and the village people in general. The first Digital Villages adopted by SBI in MP are Ratanpur and lambakheda villages near Bhopal.
The Digital Village initiative was formally announced by the SBI, Bhopal Circle, Chief General Manager KT Ajit in a function organised on the Friday at lambakheda and Ratanpur villages which were presided over by the MP of the constituency Alok Sanjar and attended by the MlAs Vishwas Sarang and Vishnu Khatri at lambakheda and by Rameshwar Sharma at Ratanpur. The July 1 also happens to be the foundation Day of State Bank of India.
Ajit on the occasion told the people that SBI has drawn up an ambitious plan of adopting many such villages across the country as SBI Digital Villages where the Bank will connect with the village people through its novel digital and technology aided services such as ATM Cards, Net banking, Mobile banking, Wallet banking, Green channel banking etc which will be aided by state of the art equipment including self-service pass book printing machines, Cash Deposit Machines and POS and Micro ATMs at the village locations. The Bank will also undertake CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) activities at these villages, aimed at improving the standard of living of the people.
Ratanpur has a population of about 6200 people and has 1450 households while lambakheda has a population of 3900 people with 806 households. Ratanpur village is linked to Misrod branch of SBI located about 3 kms away and lambakheda has been linked with CIAE Nabibag branch of the Bank which is about 2 kms away from the village.
Several facilities would be provided to the villagers including- CSPs (Cutomer Service Points) have been stationed in the villages who have been provided with a Kiosk and a POS machine to open the accounts of the village people, provide them ATM Cards and Net banking facilities and carry out basic banking transactions including deposits and fund transfer.
The CSPs have already opened substantial number of Savings Bank accounts of the village people and ATM cards have been issued to all these account holders. The Branch and CSP put together have covered almost all the village households with Bank accounts.