this story originally appeared in on dec 31 2012 new delhi staterun banks are set to ring in the new year by rolling out 5000 atms following the governments directive to make available this facility in the 51 districts selected for the launch of the direct cash transfer programme the centres ambitious programme which aims to provide benefits under 34 welfare schemes directly into beneficiaries accounts so as to plug leakages and reduce delays in transfer of subsidies is set to be rolled out on january 1 once the scheme kicks in there will be a huge load on the banks as beneficiaries will like to withdraw money and also do other transactions atms will facilitate this and lessen the burden on the banks said a finance ministry official who did not wish to be named staterun banks which had 34916 onsite atms till september are also working on providing 2 million point of sale or pos terminals across the country to allow customers to carry out small and mediumsized transactions cash transfer is just one step we want that all beneficiaries should be able to utilise other banking services it is a winwin situation as banks will also get lowcost deposits from such account holders the official said in order to facilitate payments these banks will continue to use the existing payment module which allows interbank payments according to a government official the finance ministry has conveyed to the prime ministers office that the complete switch to the aadhaarbased payment system can happen later once the aadhaar numbers reach a significant scale the technology issues can be worked out to achieve a convergence of the two models the official said the unique identification authority which issues aadhaar identity cards plans to set up 10 million microatms each at a cost of about rs 15000 while the network will cost about rs 1500 crore bankers say that the focus should remain on opening more accounts rather than the technology used to provide services at present 587 indian households avail banking facilities unless the uidai achieves significant numbers transferring to a new technology will be a lossmaking proposition for us said an executive director at a public sector bank the government has directed banks to have at least one branch or business correspondent agents bca for every village or group of villages with 1000 to 1500 households in addition the government plans to set up camps in educational institutions and villages to speed up enrolment of beneficiaries under the direct cash transfer scheme in areas where there is no functioning bca or the bcas performance is less than satisfactory the common service centres set up under the department of information technology are to be engaged as bca