West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee in Kalimpong. (Press Trust of India)
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today said that her government was determined to cover every Gram Panchayat with a bank branch to promote financial inclusion in the rural sector.
With this object in mind, Ms Banerjee declared open at a function in her office 51 new branches of Canara Bank in gram panchayats where there were no banks.
These 51 new branches covered gram panchayats across 35 blocks of 14 districts in the state. Each of these banks opened with 1,000 bank accounts, an official release said.
With the opening of these new branches, 222 gram panchayats without any bank had been brought under banking network during the past two years.
Encouraged with this programme initiated by the West Bengal Government, the Centre has also asked other states to replicate the model, the release said.
The function was attended, among others, by the state's Finance and Industry Minister Amit Mitra and Executive Director of the Canara Bank V S Krishna Kumar.