HDFC Bank continued its journey to contribute to nation–building by digitising payments, collecting direct, indirect, and local taxes, and facilitating digital commerce by integrating with various Government owned platforms like e–National Agricultural Marketplace, and Government e–marketplace and offering banking solutions to unbanked and underserved sections of the society. The focus is to ensure the unbanked sections of the society are provided relevant financing and other banking services. As a responsible banker, we aim to deliver relevant banking solutions through partnerships with Government and other entities. The goal is to enable easier availability of funds and facilitate ease of doing business for beneficiaries such as farmers, students, teachers, and healthcare workers, amongst others.
As a socially responsible citizen, HDFC Bank endeavours to contribute to nation-building by remaining focused on key areas. These include digitising workflows and helping build alternate channels for the Government, supporting the start-up ecosystem to help fuel the economy further and supporting the Government’s financial inclusion agenda.
Helping the Government digitise fund distribution efficiently
The bank plays a major role in distribution of the Government’s funds for most major schemes like central sponsored schemes, central sector schemes and funds from the 15th Finance Commission.
The Bank is one of the top 5 banks processing Government pay-outs including Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) and has also been recognised by the Ministries of Finance, Panchayati Raj and Electronics and Information Technology for its efforts in this area.
Assisted Single Nodal Agencies in streamlining fund-flows across the states.
Powering trade and digital commerce
The Bank's integration with various platforms demonstrates continued contribution to the Government’s ‘Ease of doing business’ and ‘Digital India’ initiatives. The Bank has integrated with the following platforms:
- ‘ICEGATE’ (Indian Customs and Central Excise Electronic Commerce/ Electronic Data Interchange Gateway)
- National Agriculture Markets (eNAM)
- FOIS system (Freight Operations Information System) of Indian Railways
The Bank’s long association with GeM portal, which facilitates procurement for Government departments, was extended as it was empanelled to collect GeM Caution Money for registered suppliers.
The Bank has enabled about hundred thousand suppliers to be eligible to transact on the Government e-Marketplace by offering them the facility to deposit caution money that suppliers must deposit with GeM, prior to becoming active on the platform.
Improving our foreign ties
HDFC Bank has created dedicated products for Embassies, Consulates and diplomats, helping strengthen the nation’s foreign ties. To address the pain-points of this segment, the Bank offers best-in-class solutions including seamless international Trade and Forex facilities, digital solutions for Visa collections and special current accounts to suit the needs of the expatriate community.
Promoting entrepreneurship through SmartUp programme
At HDFC Bank, we work with various State Governments and incubators/ accelerators including the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) to promote entrepreneurship under our SmartUp programme and Startup fund. We work with 45+ incubators certified by the Department of Science and Technology.
Networking and mentoring sessions are also held for our startup customers with HNIs and senior executives of the Bank. We have signed MoUs with 7 State Governments and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) to facilitate the execution of their startup policies.
Developing our children, our future
The Bank recognises the importance of today’s youth in shaping the future of the nation. Accordingly, it works at many levels to support the country’s education system.
HDFC Bank has been a key player in extending the reach of Government schemes that help school children. It has enabled state education departments to disburse funds to Government schools for fulfiling the nutritional needs under the Mid-Day Meal Scheme. The Bank has also helped disburse funds to the last mile under the Samagra Shiksha Abhiyaan Scheme, a Centrally Sponsored Scheme focused on making quality education available to students.
Disbursements to 1 Lakh+ schools benefitting 1 Cr+ students under Mid-day Meal Scheme
Further, the Bank has enhanced its education loan offering to students to enable larger numbers to avail quality education programmes. This has been achieved by removing the cap on loan values and widening the range of courses for which they can be used.
Additionally, the Bank has worked with Education Boards to digitise the payment of remuneration to faculty who offer their services during examinations. This has expedited the pace of these payments, brought transparency to the process, and ultimately resulted in higher participation rates by faculty members to conduct examinations seamlessly. Online submission of claims has also helped the boards and faculties of these institutions overcome logistical challenges posed by the pandemic in submitting and processing such claims.
The Bank also recognises the critical role played by educators and has been committed to improving their lives. A new initiative under the banner of #SalaamDilSey was launched this year for Teacher’s Day. Industry leaders from across the HDFC Group and others spoke at a special webinar aimed at helping teachers simplify their family finances. Attended by 1,300+ teachers, the webinar was well-received and will now become an annual affair given its success.
Boosting and protecting farmer incomes
The Bank has been consistently assisting the Government focused sectors such as agriculture and allied industries.
In line with the Central Government’s focus on developing Farmer Producer Organisations (FPO), the Bank has powered the platform created by a state agriculture department with integrated digital payment channels. This has enhanced farmers’ access to a common platform for trading and buying agri-produce and supplies. The platform has also helped revenue optimisation on crop yields by farmers. The Bank has also helped digitise the financial operations for the dairy industry by offering an integrated solution for the entire ecosystem, thus driving transparency in the process and improving planning since it provides visibility into both the demand and supply ends of the business.
In the current year, your Bank became the first private sector Bank to be empanelled with the Agriculture Insurance Company of India (AIC), for marketing their insurance products. Through this partnership, the Bank aims to provide financial security and income stability to farmers, in the event of natural calamities that affect their crop yield.
Making India healthy
The Bank extended its focus on healthcare during the pandemic. It enabled the smooth transfer of funds from state apex bodies to primary and secondary healthcare centres and village level hospitals. Our services also included digitisation of processes, expenditure reporting, providing digital platforms for centralised monitoring of fund utilisation, etc. The Bank has also enabled state health departments to distribute funds in a timely manner to ASHA Workers as compensation for extending healthcare services to end beneficiaries.
The pandemic provided new avenues for customising banking solutions across various segments. With the continued focus on enhancing affordability, we have enabled several large partner hospitals/clinics/IVF centres to provide loans and the ability to conveniently convert healthcare treatment costs to EMIs.
These cost-effective solutions will help customers avail quality healthcare with ease and flexibility. Our SmartBuy platform provides a large range of offers that help customers reduce their expenses on healthcare and wellness.
The Bank has alliances with 150+ providers including players in diagnostic, pharmaceutical and hospital care. Attractive membership benefit programmes are provided to customers as a value-added service across segments.
Two special programmes, providing customised banking and financial services benefits have also been created especially for doctors.
Digitisation and modernisation of citizen services
The Bank continued its participation in the digitisation and modernisation of Government to Citizen (G2C) services. This has not only helped optimise resources in Government organisations but also helped deliver services remotely. It includes services like payment of taxes, online collections of charges and fees by transport authorities as well as online tracking of case status with legal authorities like Motor Accident Claim Tribunals (MACT). This has also helped the authorities deliver un-interrupted services during the pandemic.
Taking banking to the unbanked
The Bank continued to leverage Common Service Centres (CSCs) to reach the last mile. The Bank expanded its product range in the last year to include all liability, assets and payments products. We also initiated the delivery of Government sponsored social security schemes and enabled Business Correspondents to assist in collection of delinquent EMIs. Managed by Village Level Entrepreneurs (VLEs), the CSCs are instrumental in increasing our penetration in deeper geographies. The distribution network built through CSC now includes 4 Lakh+ centres across India for banking services. Of this, more than 68% are in semi-urban and rural areas. We also have 15,000+ centres enabled across India for conducting banking transactions.
Social Security Schemes: 17,500+ enrolled for SSL schemes across APY, JBY & SBY
EMIs collected: 62,000+ transactions across Retail and SLI/JLG loans
The approach in deeper geographies is based on the ecosystem around the distribution network, our digital capabilities and rule-based underwriting to provide seamless service. In the process of training our VLEs, which includes women, we equip them with digital skills and make them self-reliant by enabling them to function as a small branch. To scale further into deeper geographies by replicating our success with CSC, we have also signed MOUs with additional partners. We are driven by the aspiration to provide banking products and services to the vast unbanked and underserved sections of the society.
Women empowerment is furthered by training 1.3 Lakh+ women from 19,600+ SHGs, making them financially self-reliant and positively impacting the lives of more than 6 Lakh fellow countrymen in semi urban and rural areas. Under the Stree Swabhiman initiative, sanitary napkin making units have been provided to women VLEs, to manufacture economic and hygienic pads. These are provided to 12,500 school-going girls who have been adopted for a year by the Bank, thereby creating an ecosystem of menstrual hygiene access.
10 Lakh citizens in the hinterlands were able to register for their COVID-19 vaccinations at CSCs with the Bank’s support. Registration costs for all 10 Lakh citizens was funded by the Bank.
Driving digitisation in Rural Banking
We have integrated 30+ APIs which power the digital delivery of 25+ best-in-class financial products and services to the last mile customer. We have also funded the digital infrastructure set-up for 4,000 villages supporting the Digi Gaon initiative of the Government.
Digital Transformation 2021
AT THE COVETED CII-DX 2021 FORUM