Heena Sharma Blog

The Reserve Bank of India Thursday said it has done away with charges on fund transfers through RTGS and NEFT routes to boost digital transactions and asked banks to pass on the benefits to customers. The Real Time Gross Settlement System (RTGS) is meant for large-value instantaneous fund transfers while the National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT) System is used for fund transfers up to Rs 2 lakh. Country's largest bank SBI charges between Re 1 and Rs 5 for transactions through NEFT and between Rs 5 and Rs 50 for RTGS route. In its statement on developmental and regulatory policies after the Monetary Policy Committee's meeting, the RBI said it levies minimum charges on banks for transactions routed through RTGS and NEFT system for other fund transfers. Banks, in turn, levy charges on their customers. In order to provide an impetus to digital funds movement, it has been decided to do away with the charges levied by the RBI for transactions processed in the RTGS

With the year coming to an end, and no communication on the issue of updating pension yet, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) could be heading towards big agitations in the New Year. The government was expected to communicate by month-end its nod for improvement of the RBI's pension scheme, but that has not been done yet. In August, the RBI staff went on mass leave, protesting the government's rigid stance on the issue, harming the "real-time gross settlement" system for a few hours. However, this time, the unions may go on an indefinite strike and the RTGS system, which is the backbone of financial transactions in the country, could get severely impacted for days on end, the unions have threatened. What is the RBI pension issue The central bank has a pension kitty of over Rs 160 billion with which it manages the pension of its staff. For this purpose, it doesn't seek money from the government like other central government departments. At the ve