RRB digitisation push: Nabard to complete IT integration of merged rural banks by Sep 30; New tech, stacks and digital pilots aimed at bridging rural-urban divide
The IT integration of recently amalgamated Regional Rural Banks (RRBs) under the 'One State One RRB' framework is likely to be completed by September 30,
Nabard
Chairman Shaji KV said on Monday.
Speaking at a CII event, Shaji said the RRB amalgamation exercise, which took effect on May 1, aimed at enhancing scale efficiency and cost rationalisation across rural banking services. Post-merger, there are now 28 RRBs operating in 26 states and 2 Union Territories, with a combined network of over 22,000 branches covering 700 districts, according to PTI.
'As of May 1, the integration of RRBs at the state level has been completed.
IT integration is expected to be finalised by September,' Shaji said.
He added that Nabard (National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development) is building a common digital infrastructure with the RRBs, rolling out credit platforms and government data systems to expand outreach in rural India. However, he acknowledged persistent challenges, including low internet bandwidth and limited awareness, but noted that collaborative efforts are underway with various organisations to resolve them.
Sponsored Links
Sponsored Links
Promoted Links
Promoted Links
You May Like
2 & 3 BHK Homes Near SGNP at Ghodbundar Rd
Purva Panorama
Click Here
Undo
by Taboola
by Taboola
Highlighting the broader digital roadmap, Shaji said Nabard is working to digitise agricultural value chains—about 20 of which are already in place—and bring more farmers, especially those without formal land records, into the formal banking system.
To further enhance reach and transparency, Nabard is also deploying blockchain-based crop traceability systems and strengthening Business Correspondent (BC) networks in rural areas.
The chairman said the government is also building additional technology stacks like the Agri Stack, Fisheries Stack, and Cooperative Stack. The 'Cooperative Stack' aims to integrate various rural schemes via Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS), creating a unified system for benefit delivery.
He noted that Nabard is leading the cooperative digitisation effort, with around 70,000 societies already digitised.
It is also supporting pilots in partnership with NGOs and FinTechs through the Financial Inclusion Fund.
Addressing the rural-urban income imbalance, Shaji pointed out that two-thirds of India's population contributes only one-third of the national income. Nabard is actively working on solutions to narrow this gap and transform farmers into agribusiness entrepreneurs.
Additionally, the institution is setting up a sandbox environment that will allow fintechs to access anonymised data for developing rural-focused solutions, he added.
Stay informed with the latest
business
news, updates on
bank holidays
and
public holidays
.
AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time of India
40 minutes ago
- Time of India
India-US trade deal: 'Close to making a deal with India,' says Donald Trump; US President releases tariff letters for countries
NEW DELHI: US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that the States was "close to making a deal with India" as he released tariff letters to various trading partners, informing them of the reciprocal tariff rates that would be effective from August 1, 2025. "We are close to making a deal with India. We've made a deal with the United Kingdom. We've made a deal with China," he said. "Others we met with, and we don't think we're going to be able to make a deal, so we just send them a letter. We're sending out letters to various countries telling them how much tariffs they have to pay. Some will maybe adjust a little bit depending if they have a cause, we're not going to be unfair about it," he added. Talking about his August 1 deadline, Trump said, "I would say firm but not a 100 per cent firm. If they call up and they say we would like to do something in a different way, we will be open to that." Trump announced new 25% tariffs on Japan and South Korea via Truth Social, followed by similar tariff letters to several other countries including Bangladesh, Indonesia, and South Africa. He warned that if trade deals aren't finalized soon, US import duties will return to the higher rates set in April. Stay informed with the latest business news, updates on bank holidays and public holidays . AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
Time of India
44 minutes ago
- Time of India
Apple AI head Ruoming Pang joins Meta as Zuckerberg boosts superintelligence team
Apple's AI lead, Ruoming Pang, has departed for Meta to join their 'Superintelligence' team for a significantly higher salary. This loss comes as Apple's internal AI team faces challenges, including debates over using third-party AI and engineer departures. Meta, under Zuckerberg, is aggressively recruiting AI talent and investing heavily in the field, signaling a major shift in the AI landscape. Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Meta is hiring many top AI experts Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Apple's AI team facing internal problems FAQs Ruoming Pang, Apple's top executive in charge of AI foundation models, is leaving Apple to join Meta. Pang joined Apple in 2021 from Alphabet Inc. and led the team behind Apple's foundation models that power Apple Intelligence and AI features, as stated by the now moving to Meta's new 'Superintelligence' team, where he'll earn tens of millions of dollars per year, according to Bloomberg's sources. This move is a big loss for Apple, whose internal AI team, called AFM – Apple Foundation Models , has been under pressure lately, according to the Meta, Pang will be part of Mark Zuckerberg's top AI initiative called Meta Superintelligence Labs . Meta recently reorganized its AI teams under this division and hired Alexandr Wang, former CEO of Scale AI, as Chief AI Officer, as per is going all-in on AI and has invested billions, including a big deal last month that valued Scale AI at $29 billion. Zuckerberg is personally recruiting AI talent, often hosting candidates at his homes in Silicon Valley and Lake Tahoe, Bloomberg big names hired by Meta include Daniel Gross (startup founder), Nat Friedman (ex-GitHub CEO), Yuanzhi Li (from OpenAI), and Anton Bakhtin (worked on Claude at Anthropic), according to the report by departure adds to Apple's AI leadership challenges. The company is debating using third-party AI models like OpenAI or Anthropic for the next-gen Siri. This shift has hurt morale in Pang's team. Some engineers are planning to leave Apple, and Tom Gunter, Pang's deputy, already left last month as per the AFM team, with ~100 people, built models for things like Genmoji, Priority Notifications, and summaries of emails/ team will now be led by Zhifeng Chen, and Apple is changing the structure to add more managers like Chong Wang, Zirui Wang, Chung-Cheng Chiu, and Guoli Yin, as mentioned in the report by AI strategy is now mainly handled by Craig Federighi (Software Chief), Mike Rockwell (Vision Pro engineer, now leading Siri) , and John Giannandrea (leads AI research, but his role has been reduced).Apple's WWDC in June showed only a few AI updates, like AI call translation and text message summaries. Most of the major AI features came from partners like OpenAI and Google, not Apple's own models. Apple also updated Xcode to support code completion using ChatGPT and Claude, as per the report by Pang left Apple to join Meta's AI team for a much higher pay and bigger role in advanced AI Superintelligence Labs is Mark Zuckerberg's new AI division focused on building powerful, human-level AI systems.
Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
VCs back AI startups to shake up Indian IT services industry
Academy Empower your mind, elevate your skills ETtech A new wave of AI-first startups is catching the attention of top-tier venture capital firms , as they look to back companies reinventing traditional IT services Accel , and Elevation Capital are among the country's top venture capital firms which are scouting for artificial intelligence (AI)-first startups to place early bets, several investors told application development and infrastructure maintenance to software testing and customer support, AI is beginning to fundamentally reshape services that have long relied on large human workforces, they said.'AI is making IT services non-linear and it opens up opportunities for startups to deliver services faster, cheaper and at a higher quality,' said Rajan Anandan, managing director at Peak XV Partners, which has evaluated several companies using AI agents to automate application maintenance, an area where big monies are spent shift isn't about replacing traditional IT services overnight, but rather building leaner, AI-enabled firms from scratch, said the VC executives ET spoke with.'We have created a map of everything IT services companies do and view each line of business as an opportunity for a new AI-native company,' said Anandan, adding that Peak XV is evaluating horizontal startups focused on cross-sector capabilities as well as vertical ones building AI-first solutions for specific industries, such as banking, insurance, healthcare and Venture Partners has already backed two startups focused on automating core IT services. Founder and partner Ritesh Banglani said AI is also disrupting knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) functions such as accounting, wealth management, and legal support.'Our belief is that India holds a special advantage in providing these AI-led services to the world. We know how to scale people-heavy operations and sell services – not just software,' he said. 'Our bet is that tech-first services startups will be able to build distribution faster than the incumbents can build technology. We have already invested in two AI-led services startups this year and look forward to funding several more.'Accel India is also bullish. 'By being able to price for the outcome, AI-first services companies can charge like services but earn like software,' said Anagh Prasad, vice president at the firm. 'Going forward, we'd continue looking for full-stack AI companies, especially in verticals like accounting, legal, insurance, as well as selective late stage services companies undergoing rapid AI to Krishna Mehra, AI partner at Elevation Capital, the transformation of IT and IT-enabled services is already underway and will accelerate in the next few years. 'We expect action across BPO, KPO, knowledge work, and customer support. Winners and losers will significantly change,' Mehra, who is based in the US, said, adding that even legacy IT firms may be targets for buyouts and AI-led investors taking early bets on startups looking to disrupt the nearly $300-billion IT services industry in India, they said the behemoths are not watching this from the had earlier reported that Japanese investor SoftBank is also eyeing buyout deals in India to push AI-led IT, BPO transformation.'Incumbent ITeS majors are hardly sitting out of the AI transition. Most companies are not only helping clients implement AI, they are also using it extensively themselves to improve productivity and speed of delivery,' Banglani investors are looking at backing teams that not only comprise AI talent but also bring domain expertise from IT services companies of dealing with large enterprise customers.A telling sign of the growing adoption of AI at large IT services companies is the widening gap between revenue and headcount growth. According to Nasscom, the industry grew by 5.1% in FY25 from the previous year, while its workforce expanded by just 2.2% – indicating a shift towards more tech-driven, less people-intensive operations.'The entry of AI in this sector would be very disruptive to jobs. There might be a lot of global rebalancing of the workforce but it's not all gloom and doom from a jobs perspective,' Elevation Capital's Mehra said.
