Abhirnaraj

Jitu Munda (55) had approached the Odisha Grameen Bank multiple times to withdraw the savings of his sister, who had died two months earlier. Bank authorities asked him to furnish the required documents but failed to make him understand what exactly was needed or how he could arrange it. An uneducated tribal man, with no knowledge of paperwork or procedures and unable to comprehend the requirement of documentary proof, exhumed his sister’s remains, placed them in a sack, and carried them to the bank as evidence of her death. Once the issue went viral, the bank sprang into action and are now saying that he will be guided and helped. But shouldn’t this be the standard practice? Grameen banks were established for financial inclusion, to serve the most vulnerable sections of society, not to burden them with rigid, urban-centric bureaucratic processes they neither understand nor can navigate. Moreover, the staff in such banks are mostly local and are expected to understand the ground realities far better. If even they fail to bridge the gap between policy and people, then the very purpose of these institutions stands defeated.