Jayshree Venkatesan
Jayshree Venkatesan , Public Policy Scholar, The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy, is an independent consultant on Financial Inclusion. She was involved in founding IFMR Mezzanine Finance, a group company within IFMR Trust that provided quasi-equity finance to early stage and not-for-profit microfinance institutions. She was Chief Executive Officer of IFMR Mezzanine Finance, and IFMR Advisory Services. She is the recipient of the Chevening Gurukul Fellowship for Leadership and Excellence for 2014, awarded by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office and hosted by King’s College, London, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA), UK.
This report presents the findings of a primary study conducted across four districts in Tamil Nadu about the implementation of the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) and its implications for achieving full financial inclusion. The need to conduct the study just prior to the one-year anniversary stemmed from the quick success that banks and the government proclaimed. Given that the programme was quite similar to previous attempts at complete financial inclusion, the stark difference in success came as a surprise and demanded a study.The study found that several of the problems that earlier attempts at financial inclusion faced, such as bankers acting as large barriers to access, exclusion of the most vulnerable and lack of awareness of programme features, continue to persist even with the PMJDY. These findings have been placed in the context of what has been observed with large government programmes with explanations drawn from theory and secondary literature, wherever relevant. The paper examines both design and implementation gaps, providing possible solutions for re-design and implementation.[PDF 9.88 MB]
The Budget presented by the Union Finance Minister, Arun Jaitley, on Feb. 28, 2015, makes a case for inclusive growth within the framework of "b