The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) announced on Thursday that 30 banks are now part of the Udgam portal, which helps people find unclaimed money.
This makes it easier for people to locate and claim their unclaimed funds.
The RBI introduced the Udgam (Unclaimed Deposits – Gateway to Access Information) portal on August 17.
Its goal is to make it simple for people to find unclaimed money in multiple banks in one place.
At first, they started this service with seven banks. Back then, the RBI said they would add more banks to it gradually by October 15.
In a statement, the central bank said, ‘We want to let people know that on September 28, 2023, they added information about 30 banks to the portal.
This now ‘includes’ about 90% of the unclaimed deposits in the Depositor Education and Awareness (DEA) Fund.
Which banks are part of it?
These 30 banks include all the big government banks like State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, Punjab National Bank, Canara Bank, and Bank of India.
Additionally, there are foreign banks like Citi Bank, Standard Chartered, and HSBC, as well as private sector banks such as HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, and Axis Bank.
The website is made to help people check for unclaimed money or accounts and claim their deposits or activate their deposit accounts at their banks.
It was developed by the Reserve Bank of India Information Technology Private Limited, Indian Financial Technology, and Allied Services, along with the banks that are part of it.
State Bank of India holds the most unclaimed funds
It’s important to know that government banks had moved around Rs 35,000 crore of unclaimed money to the RBI by February 2023.
This money was from accounts where no transactions happened for 10 years or longer.
The State Bank of India (SBI) had the most unclaimed money, totaling Rs 8,086 crore.
Punjab National Bank has the second highest unclaimed amount at Rs 5,340 crore, followed by Canara Bank with Rs 4,558 crore, and Bank of Baroda with Rs 3,904 crore.
In the regular process, if no one claims the money they deposited in a bank for 10 years, it gets moved to the ‘Depositor Education and Awareness’ Fund of the Reserve Bank.
