The Hindu Business Line : New tech tools for rural banking

Mumbai, Nov. 27 With major banks increasingly focusing on tapping the rural markets, banks and technology solutions providers are also gearing up to develop suitable solutions for rural 7banking.

According to Mr Ramakrishnan, Chairman and Managing Director, Andhra Bank, tapping rural financial markets and achieving financial inclusion are possible only by taking a technology route.

“We need to devise new technologies/methods to make banking more comprehensive and operationally effective,” Mr Ramakrishnan told Business Line on the sidelines of Bancon 2007.

Biometric ATMs, smart cards and mobile ATMs should be deployed to expand the reach of banks in rural market, he said.

Many technology firms are either expanding their product baskets or upgrading their current offerings to cater to the needs of the banking industry.

“This is an emerging market and there is lot of scope for end-to-end solutions in rural banking,” Mr Mandeep Singh, Head (Business Development), Opus Software Solutions Ltd, said.

Biometric ATM

The Mumbai-based company has recently deployed independent biometric solution that can be tagged on to any ATM.

“The advantage of this is that the banks need not depend on a particular ATM vendor to offer biometric services,” Mr Singh said.

The company has already deployed the solution in some ATMs of three banks including Corporation Bank and Dena Bank.

Smart card

Opus is also developing a smart card, which can be used without linking it to any bank account. “Currently, the smart cards are tagged to a bank account. We have developed a smart card, which allows direct credit of wages (or any other earning) of a person to the card itself. This is targeted at farm labourers,” he said.

The company is currently in talks with a couple of banks to deploy the card.

Says Mr Niranjan Gosavi, Head (Business Development), Atom Technologies Ltd: “We are revolutionising the concept of banking correspondent in rural areas by roping in Self-Help Groups and PCO operators. We will provide them phones, smart cards and swipe machines to take up financial transactions.”

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