By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, January 8, 2017 : Odisha Government on Sunday decided to issue 11.40 lakh RuPay cards to farmers of the state by March this year.

State cooperation minister Damodar Rout said that it is mandatory for the State Government to implement the RuPay scheme even though its benefits can only be ascertained after a successful implementation.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently had asked the state governments to convert Kisan Credit Card to RuPay cards.

Revealing further details of the scheme, Odisha State Cooperative Bank Managing Director Tusharkanta Panda said that the new cards are essentially redesigned Kisan cards that now come fitted with a micro chip enabling it to store detailed information about the card holder.

“We are taking necessary steps to provide Point of Sale (POS) machines in all 708 samitis through which the farmers can withdraw money by using their RuPay card,” he added.

Besides, these cards will enable the farmers to withdraw limited amount of money from ATMs of nationalised and private banks and go a long way in aiding to the cashless infrastructure, said Panda.

It may be mentioned here that the cooperative banks have been asked to extend financial support for Europay, Master Card and Visa chip based cards, along with RuPay card and installation of Micro ATMs to support cashless payment infrastructure.

According to reports, so far, various cooperative banks and commercial banks in the state have distributed as many as 44 lakh and 9 lakh Kisan Cards respectively. The State Government plans to convert all these Kisan cards to RuPay cards by June this year.

RuPay cards can currently be used in 1.45 lakh ATMs and 8.75 lakh POS terminals across the country along with over 10,000 e-commerce websites.