Failure of Modi Govt: Your Money Is Not Safe in Indian Banks

Some banks may allow the customers to withdraw a fraction of their money, but the customers will always be at the mercy of the rogue banks.

By Rakesh Raman

India’s Yes Bank has put an upper withdrawal limit of just Rs. 50,000 per account for the depositors. That means, you will not be able to withdraw more money from the bank, although the Indian government is giving hollow assurances to the depositors that their money is safe.

With a superficial step, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) placed Yes Bank under a one-month moratorium on Thursday, but the top bank could not give any believable commitment to the customers who are likely to lose their money deposited in the bank.

India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman – who is not qualified to handle financial systems – has blamed the Congress government for the Yes Bank crisis, although the PM Narendra Modi’s government has ruined the entire economy during the past 6 years of its rule in the country.

Yes Bank is not the only bank where people are going to lose their money. There are a number of other banks that are showing enormous losses and they are burdened with NPAs (non-performing assets) of lakhs of crores of rupees. In other words, they will not be able to pay to the depositors who have put their money in the banks.

Take, for example, the Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank. The RBI had imposed operational restrictions on PMC Bank for six months from 23 September 2019. As a result, the bank account holders were not allowed to withdraw more than Rs. 1,000 from their accounts. Later, the limit was increased only to Rs. 10,000 that the customers can withdraw.

As the Modi government is extremely corrupt, it is not stopping the rampant bank frauds that have been happening. The state-run banks have reported fraud of Rs. 95,760 crore ($13.34 billion) in the first 6 months of the fiscal year 2019-20 ending in March. Reuters reports that the number of fraud cases touched 5,743 during April-September period.

If the corrupt Indian rulers had their way, soon you will lose your money deposited in domestic banks. The current Modi government is also trying to make a law that will allow banks to expropriate the depositors’ money.

YOUR MONEY IS BANK’S MONEY

The Financial Resolution and Deposit Insurance (FRDI) Bill proposed by the government is supposed to bail out loss-making banks by using public money. Obviously, the bank customers like you will not have any right to withdraw your own money.

Worse, your screams will not be heard by the courts and other authorities because the Modi government will make it a law that will empower banks to gobble up the customers’ money.

As the Modi government has majority in Parliament, the FRDI Bill is expected to be approved. The opposition parties in India are so weak that they will not be able to challenge Modi’s decision.

Subsequently, when you will go to the banks to withdraw your money, the banks may simply refuse to give you your own money. You have already seen the glimpses of such a despotic imposition when Modi had announced his personal demonetization decision.

While customers were standing – some even died – in queues, banks were not allowing them to take their money because the Modi government did not give new currency notes to banks. But the demonetization thing was only a trailer. The full movie will come after the FRDI enforcement.

The proposed FRDI law will allow the government-owned banks to offset their bad loans amounting to nearly Rs 8 lakh crore (approximately $120 billion) with the public money. At present, some private banks are in a better shape, but they will also not protect your money and use it unscrupulously to earn more profits.

ROGUE BANKS

Some banks may allow the customers to withdraw a fraction of their money, but the customers will always be at the mercy of the rogue banks. Customers may think that they will withdraw most of their money from banks before FRDI implementation and keep it at their homes.

But that is not possible. Modi government has been forcing the customers to link their Aadhaar identities with bank accounts and mobile phones. Moreover, the banks have already started asking customers to show their NRC (National Population Register) proof, although Modi lied that NRC has never been discussed by his government.

When the customers will withdraw an unusual amount of money from banks, the government will immediately come to know and raid their homes to recover that money.

You are being squeezed from all sides. As the government is pushing for digital transactions, consumers will not be allowed to buy goods in cash beyond a certain limit. That means, when you need it, you will not be able to use cash stored in your home.

And if Modi government decided to impose demonetization again, your money at home will be reduced to mere pieces of paper. If you think you will buy additional property with your money instead of keeping it in a bank, you will not be able to do so because of Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Amendment Act, 2016.

SOCIAL UNREST

So, you will have no other option but to keep your money in banks – and lose it. But why does the government want to run the loss-making banks? The government cannot shutter these banks because it will have to lay off all bank employees. It will exacerbate the already painful unemployment situation in the country and will lead to social unrest.

However, by forcing digital transactions the government is trying to reduce the workload of banks so that it could terminate the services of some employees in order to make the banks leaner.

The proposed FRDI Bill is supposed to speed up the banks revival process by misusing customers’ money, although the Modi government is telling lies that depositors’ money in banks will be safe.

Assuming that the government is telling the truth, the depositors’ money in banks will be safe to the extent that they will be able to see it in their passbooks but will not be able to use it.

While India is facing the worst socio-economic crisis under the Modi government, Modi is focusing only on Hindu-Muslim and Mandir-Masjid issues to spread violence in the country.

DISCLOSURE AND APPEAL: I am an independent journalist and do not belong to any political party. My editorial objectivity and aversion to the flawed political system in India can be assessed from the fact that I have not voted in any Indian election during the past more than 2 decades. I strongly believe that all political parties in India are full of dishonest politicians who are hell-bent to further destroy the country which exists merely as an underdeveloped piece of land on the face of the earth.

Moreover, I am not getting donations or any other financial support for my editorial and social work. I offer all these services selflessly with my own money. Please click here to donate.

By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. He is the founder of a humanitarian organization RMN Foundation which is working in diverse areas to help the disadvantaged and distressed people in the society. He also creates and publishes a number of digital publications and research reports on different subjects.