“Of course, these basic banking accounts will come with some in-built overdraft facility and RuPay debit cards with an inbuilt accident cover of 1 lakh. We are awaiting the final announcement of the scheme by the Prime Minister.”

Inclusive pension is also one of the pillars of the proposed comprehensive financial inclusion programme.

“Pension under ‘the mission mode’ will lay emphasis on this facility for the lower income segment and the unorganized workers,” said R V Verma, acting chairman of the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA).

“We will seek to achieve and expand the scope of the National Pension Scheme (NPS) to serve the disadvantaged sections of the population through active involvement and participation of all categories of intermediary institutions like banks, NBFCs, MFIs, NGOs, corporates and annuity service providers,” Mr Verma added.

Though micro-insurance will come in the second phase of the programme, insurers have already started working on it.

“While the already existing 4,000 micro offices of the four PSU general insurers would be strengthened, over 2 lakh existing business correspondents will be asked to sell micro insurance products to ensure the last mile connectivity,” New India Assurance chairman and managing director G Srinivasan said.

“Though micro-insurance will come in the second phase only, we have already started working on it,” he added.

The premium for the low-cost insurance products, which is to be paid by the beneficiaries or from subsidy under the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana scheme, will range between 100 and 300 per annum, New India Assurance general manager K Sanath Kumar said.

Nabard will provide the initial 1,000 crore to create a credit guarantee fund to cover possible defaults on overdraft accounts under the scheme, a Nabard official said.

Several rounds of meetings have already been held by the Department of Financial Services with all the stakeholders of the programme, including state-owned banks, insurance companies and pension regulator PFRDA.

The banking sector would be expanding itself to hire an additional 50,000 business correspondents (BCs), launch over 7,000 branches and more than 20,000 new ATMs in the first phase, Sandhu told the IBA, adding that around 50,000 BCs are likely to be appointed in rural areas for the programme alone.