Jan-Dhan could be up for grabs by fraudsters, says RBI

The Reserve Bank of India on Tuesday warned that the `Jan Dhan' accounts by which the Centre directly puts money into people's accounts could be a source of massive fraud. The RBI, therefore, asked the banks to keep a check on the Jan-Dhan accounts. Reserve Bank Deputy Governor SS Mundhra said on Tuesday that the banks should have a proper mechanism to keep a check on Jan-dhan accounts. He said the newly opened accounts under the Prime Minister Jan Dhan Yojana could be vulnerable to massive fraud. Banks should guard against misuse of these accounts. He said third parties could be used to launder the proceeds of fraud schemes by criminals who could gain illegal access to deposit accounts by recruiting them as money mules. In a recent case in Punjab, there was an account of a daily wage earner through whose account Rs 1 crore transactions had taken place. This came to light when the Income-tax authority served notice on the account holder.