The postal department will reach out to various educational institutions across the state to help girl students open Selvamagal Semippu accounts. It will organize a campaign in the state on February 9 and 10.
The nationwide campaign plans to organize camps in various schools, anganwadis and public health centers to cover the girl child in a big way.
“We are planning to run similar campaigns in rural areas to inculcate the habit of small savings among people,” said an official.
The hike in interest rates on savings accounts of various post offices from January 1 also means that more investors are turning to post offices. About six lakh savings accounts were opened in the state in January. Of this, about 2.58 lakh accounts were added during the three-day campaign at the end of the month, officials said.
There are about 2.91 crore savings bank accounts in various savings schemes across the state.
Senior Citizen Savings Scheme
Depositors in the Senior Citizen Savings Scheme will get the highest interest rate of 8%. With the recent budget announcements, the department is expected to get 10% more patronage.
To make transactions easier for the customers, the department has brought most of the savings schemes under online, mobile banking with fund transfer facilities. Officials said people need not visit post offices to open or close fixed deposits and recurring deposits as they can opt for these transactions through online and mobile banking. Also, online funds transfer can be done through NEFT or RTGS to bank accounts.
Till now, only senior citizens and those with monthly income were required to visit post offices for schemes. But senior citizens can use online or ATM to withdraw interest. Officials said that the e-passbook facility was launched recently.
KS Subramanian, president of the Tamil Nadu Elders Welfare Association, wanted the income tax exemption for National Savings Certificates to be increased from the current limit of Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 3 lakh per financial year for the benefit of senior and very senior citizens.