Demonetisation: Six months on, 30,000 Gurgaon workers yet to get bank accounts
The lead district manager has said a number of workers are yet to go cashless
Six months after demonetisation, thousands of people working in the unorganised sector in the city are yet to get their bank accounts opened because of lack of documentation such as Aadhaar and PAN cards.
Lead district manager (LDM) RC Nayak said the district still has over 30,000 workers without bank accounts who draw salaries in cash. Those who have somehow managed to get a bank account opened cannot withdraw more than Rs10,000 a month. Nayak said lack of Aadhaar and PAN card was a major hurdle in opening bank accounts for such workers.
In Gurgaon district, there are around two lakh workers engaged in industries and other sectors. They had been drawing their salaries in cash until November 8, 2016 when the Centre scrapped Rs500 and Rs1,000 notes. Labour departments were also told to make online salary transactions mandatory.
According to Nayak, the banks opened around 1.2 lakh accounts for workers, of which 90% were Jan Dhan accounts. Account holders in Jan Dhan accounts cannot withdraw more than Rs10,000 a month.
“Having a Jan Dhan account means the account holders have not yet submitted PAN to the bank. Once PAN is submitted, the account holders can use it as regular accounts and carry out transactions as they want,” said Nayak.
The labour department and banks have worked jointly in the past six months and held 6,000 spot camps in industrial areas and elsewhere to open bank accounts of workers.
Deputy labour commissioner, Gurgaon, RK Saini, claimed, “There are around two lakh workers in the district
and most of them now have bank accounts for online salary transactions.”
Manmohan Gaind, president, Manesar Industry Welfare Association (MIWA), said, “We have managed to resolve the issue of bank accounts for all our workers in the past six months.”
“The workers are satisfied as most of them have bank accounts. The bank account issue was a major problem with workers engaged in small factories and hired through contractors,” said Kuldeep Janghu, general secretary, Maruti Udyog Kamgaar Union.
However, on the issue of cash flow in bank ATMs, which was a major complaint in the days immediately following the demonetisation announcement, the LDC said there is no dearth of cash in the 715 bank branches and 1,306 ATMs across the district.
Hemant Kumar, resident of New Colony, said, “There is no problem in withdrawing cash from ATMs and banks. I have been successfully withdrawing money for the past couple of months.”