Banks receive Rs.5,729 Crore from DEA Fund for Settling Unclaimed Deposit Refunds

The “Depositor Education and Awareness Fund Scheme, 2014”, was notified by Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which covers norms related to unclaimed deposits and outlines details of utilisation of fund including, inter alia, promotion of depositors’ interests and other purposes as may be specified by the RBI.

Dr. Bhagwat Kisanrao Karad, Union Minister of State for Finance, mentioned this in a written response to a question in Lok Sabha.

In the last five years, the Minister stated that as a result of various steps taken to return unclaimed deposits to their rightful owners/claimants, a total of 5,729 crore has been transferred from the “Depositor Education and Awareness” (DEA) Fund to banks towards refund of settling unclaimed deposits.

Giving more information, Dr Karad stated that RBI has taken various steps to reduce the quantum of unclaimed deposits and return such deposits to rightful claimants. Banks are, inter-alia, advised to –

1) display the list of unclaimed deposits which are inactive/inoperative for ten years or more on the bank’s websites;

2) find the whereabouts of the customers and their legal heirs to return unclaimed deposits to the rightful claimants;

3) formulate board approved policy on classification of unclaimed deposits; and

4) put in place a grievance redressal mechanism for quick resolution of complaints, record keeping, and periodic review of unclaimed deposit accounts.

Further, the Minister stated, RBI has announced to set-up a Centralised Web portal for public to search unclaimed deposits across multiple banks.

The RBI has also initiated the “100 Days 100 Pays” campaign for banks to trace and settle the top 100 unclaimed deposits of every bank in every district of the country within 100 days, from 1.6.2023 to 8.9.2023, according to the Minister.