CEASELESS PENALISATION OF POOR AND MIDDLE CLASS

BY PUBLIC SECTOR BANKS

GB Sivanandam

Banks in India have time and again prescribed minimum balance to be maintained in various type of Savings Accounts.  Presently, almost all citizens of the country need an account in the bank for their minimum financial transactions.  Cash payments are fast reducing and even the wages payable for the MGNREGA 100 days employment guarantee scheme also is credited to the account of the worker.  Employees of even small industries and workshops need to have an account for their salary credit.  It is common knowledge that these sections of the population and also many crores of families who struggle to make both ends meet can hardly leave behind in their accounts the minimum balance required to be maintained in their accounts.  It is absolutely unintentional as their economic condition forces them to utilize the last rupee in their account for sustenance.  It is cruel, immoral and unjustified to levy minimum balance charges on accounts maintained by this section of the society under which a sizeable section of the population belongs.

On 29^th July 2024, to a question raised in the Lok Sabha regarding the subject of Minimum Balance Charges levied by Public Sector Banks, the Minister of State for Finance has stated that an amount of Rs.8494.82 crores had been collected from accounts for not maintaining minimum balance in Savings Accounts for the past five years.  State Bank of India does not levy these charges since March 2020.

It is obvious that this amount of Rs.8494.82 crores had been mostly collected from the section of the population who struggle to survive in the precarious job market and unfavourable living conditions prevalent in our country.  They are the unorganized and voiceless section of the society who silently suffer the various atrocities unleashed on them in some form or other.  The continuous exploitation of these people is only exacerbated by this act of Public Sector Banks levying Minimum Balance Charges on the already battered and bruised sector.

Many new types of charges have been devised by Banks and levied on customer accounts like ATM card charges, inoperative account charges etc., which were unheard of years ago.  Banks tend to ostensibly augment their income through macro levels – levying small fines and charges on a large number of accounts – while they resort to huge write-offs to the corporate sector, every year, due to faulty government policies, which runs into lacs of crores. 

This has been the policy of the present regime at the Centre, to burden the common man in order to fill the coffers of the favoured few.  And Public Sector Banks have not been spared as they are being pressurized to squeeze the common man accounts in the macro level to derive a substantial sum of money to mitigate the banks from their losses, to some extent, due to huge write-offs which is again a result of government pressure. Such levy of charges on hapless people is nothing but cruelty and is often termed as a daylight robbery by these banks.  

These are the bye products of neo-liberal policies pursued by successive governments without a human face. The service charges on non-maintenance of minimum balance in banks should be withdrawn.

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