Section 01
Place, user & journey
Define who, where, through which channel and at what moment.
Record geography, user type, product or public-finance process, provider, amount range where safe, access channel, date, service stage, current outcome and evidence period. Street-level reports may locate a service problem, but personal financial data must remain private and securely aggregated.
Connected system
Access, Identity & Payments. Trace effects across household security, business production, jobs, tax, public services and national resilience.
Data reference table
Evidence Snapshot
Read each value with its reporting period, population and limitations. A historical national reference is not a local baseline or proof that an IFT proposal works.
5 source-linked reference records. 3 measurement records still need data and a review of their relevance.
| Signal | Reference Value | Period / Population | How to Read It | Source Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PMJDY accounts opened | 55.98 crore accounts Historical reference | As at 25 July 2025 India; accounts under PMJDY | Shows the reported reach of this particular basic-bank-account scheme. Limitations: Accounts are not necessarily unique people, active users or households with adequate financial protection. It is not an all-adult banking-coverage rate. | Ministry of Finance, Department of Financial Services Official parliamentary answer Rajya Sabha answer 2636: Credit disbursed to PMJDY account holders Published: 2025-08-12 Publication checked: 2026-11-04 Value, period and coverage checked in publication |
| Aggregate deposits in PMJDY accounts | ₹2,61,982 crore Historical reference | As at 25 July 2025 India; PMJDY account deposit balance | A stock of balances held in the scheme at the stated date. Limitations: Not household income, average wealth, emergency-saving adequacy or a measure of how evenly balances are distributed. Do not divide by a different-date account total. | Ministry of Finance, Department of Financial Services Official parliamentary answer Rajya Sabha answer 2636: Credit disbursed to PMJDY account holders Published: 2025-08-12 Publication checked: 2026-11-04 Value, period and coverage checked in publication |
| PMJDY account holders reported to have used overdraft | 35,99,662 account holders Historical reference | As at March 2025 India; PMJDY overdraft-facility users reported by the government | The answer reports use of the scheme’s overdraft facility. Limitations: The wording is facility use as reported, not a verified count of currently active borrowers, eligible-but-excluded people or successful livelihood outcomes. | Ministry of Finance, Department of Financial Services Official parliamentary answer Rajya Sabha answer 2636: Credit disbursed to PMJDY account holders Published: 2025-08-12 Publication checked: 2026-11-04 Value, period and coverage checked in publication |
| PMJDY overdraft amount outstanding | ₹393.02 crore Historical reference | As at March 2025 India; PMJDY overdraft facility | An outstanding credit-balance stock reported for the facility. Limitations: Not annual loan disbursement, repayment performance, borrower affordability or evidence of responsible lending terms. | Ministry of Finance, Department of Financial Services Official parliamentary answer Rajya Sabha answer 2636: Credit disbursed to PMJDY account holders Published: 2025-08-12 Publication checked: 2026-11-04 Value, period and coverage checked in publication |
| RBI Financial Inclusion Index | 67.0 index points on a 0–100 scale Historical reference | Year ending March 2025 India; national composite index across access, usage and quality | An existing RBI composite based on 97 indicators across access, usage and quality. It is an index value, not a percentage and not an IFT-created score. Limitations: The national index cannot establish local or subgroup inclusion. Underlying component records were not independently reproduced or audited. Do not combine this value with unrelated indicators into another score. | Reserve Bank of India Official central bank release Financial Inclusion Index for March 2025 Published: 2025-07-22 Publication checked: 2026-11-04 Value, period and coverage checked in publication |
| Safe and active access | Not established Data required — not zero | Reporting period: Information Required Population and geography: Information Required | Proposed measure; no observed value is established here. Limitations: Define the measure, unit, reporting period and covered population; obtain a traceable dataset and review its suitability for this topic before using a number. | Source organisation: Information Required Direct source URL: not yet verified Source publication date: not established Verification status: Data required |
| Affordability and suitability | Not established Data required — not zero | Reporting period: Information Required Population and geography: Information Required | Proposed measure; no observed value is established here. Limitations: Define the measure, unit, reporting period and covered population; obtain a traceable dataset and review its suitability for this topic before using a number. | Source organisation: Information Required Direct source URL: not yet verified Source publication date: not established Verification status: Data required |
| Shock resilience and protection | Not established Data required — not zero | Reporting period: Information Required Population and geography: Information Required | Proposed measure; no observed value is established here. Limitations: Define the measure, unit, reporting period and covered population; obtain a traceable dataset and review its suitability for this topic before using a number. | Source organisation: Information Required Direct source URL: not yet verified Source publication date: not established Verification status: Data required |
Different surveys, administrative records, estimates and reporting years are not interchangeable. No combined IFT score is calculated from these rows.
Evidence coverage and review log (CSV) · Structured evidence register (JSON)
Section 02
Problem
State the user harm, market gap or public-value failure precisely.
Every eligible citizen should have access to a safe, usable formal financial account.
Formal access can coexist with inactive accounts, unsafe borrowing, inadequate protection and unequal access to productive capital.
Fragmented finance data can hide household stress, delayed business payments, fraud, service outages and poor public-spending outcomes.
Specify affected users, frequency, cost, timing, provider or institution, coping behaviour, evidence strength and what remains unknown.
Section 03
Root causes
Test alternative explanations before prescribing finance.
Products designed around institutions rather than user journeys
Look for incentive, information, product-design, infrastructure, capacity, enforcement and trust failures; do not blame the user by default.
Weak transparency, financial capability and grievance closure
Look for incentive, information, product-design, infrastructure, capacity, enforcement and trust failures; do not blame the user by default.
Fragmented household, enterprise, market and public-finance evidence
Look for incentive, information, product-design, infrastructure, capacity, enforcement and trust failures; do not blame the user by default.
Short-term allocation incentives and insufficient resilience testing
Look for incentive, information, product-design, infrastructure, capacity, enforcement and trust failures; do not blame the user by default.
Section 04
Evidence
Match every claim to the right evidence layer.
- Evidence Core question Minimum context
- System data What happened, how often and where? Definition · denominator · period · source
User or firm evidence Who faced cost, exclusion, delay or harm? Journey · subgroup · method · privacy
Evaluation Did the intervention cause a better outcome? Comparator · follow-up · uncertainty · cost
Evidence contract Verified official evidence, illustrative scenarios and community submissions remain visibly distinct.
Section 05
Complete system & source brief
Access, Identity & Payments
Make formal finance usable, secure and resilient—not merely available.
Goal:
Every eligible citizen should have access to a safe, usable formal financial account.
Focus:
- 04 Account access
- 05 Simple onboarding
- 06 Low-cost services
- 07 Rural banking
- 08 Digital banking
- 09 Assisted banking
- 10 Accessibility for elderly/persons with disabilities
But:
12 ACCOUNT OPEN ≠ FINANCIAL INCLUSION
Actual inclusion means the person can use financial services safely and affordably.
These source points are converted into an operating chain with actor, rule, service, data, finance, grievance, accountability, feedback and cross-pillar dependencies.
Section 06
India-fit solutions
Improve the journey without creating hidden risk.
Define the user, place, financial journey, risk and desired real-world outcome.
Separate access, usage, affordability, suitability, reliability and measured benefit.
Publish terms, data definitions, institutional responsibility and remedy routes.
Pilot with consumer protection, privacy, bias, cyber and financial-stability safeguards.
Decision checks
Safety; Suitability; Affordability; Privacy; Fairness; Access; Reliability; Remedy; Productivity; Stability
Section 07
Roadmap
Protect immediately, diagnose deeply, pilot safely and scale on evidence.
- 0–30 DAYS
- Define & protect
Verify user harm, jurisdiction, provider, urgency, transaction or budget trail, privacy boundary and immediate remedy.
- 30–90 DAYS
- Diagnose
Map the end-to-end journey, costs, exclusions, incentives, complaints, data gaps and plausible alternatives.
- 3–18 MONTHS
- Pilot
Select one district and one clearly defined user group; map the complete financial journey, remove one verified friction, test safeguards and compare outcomes with a transparent baseline.
- 1–10+ YEARS
- Evaluate & scale
Scale only after independent review of consumer benefit, equity, viability, cyber resilience, fiscal effect and unintended risk.
Section 08
How to measure improvement
Track financial and real-world outcomes together.
KPI 01
Safe and active access
Baseline · target · actual · user group · geography · period · source
KPI 02
Affordability and suitability
Baseline · target · actual · user group · geography · period · source
KPI 03
Shock resilience and protection
Baseline · target · actual · user group · geography · period · source
KPI 04
Productive capital and payment reliability
Baseline · target · actual · user group · geography · period · source
KPI 05
Complaint, fraud and recovery outcomes
Baseline · target · actual · user group · geography · period · source
KPI 06
Public value per rupee
Baseline · target · actual · user group · geography · period · source
Decision gate Scale verified, suitable and stable benefit; modify partial results; stop consumer harm, hidden cost, exclusion, data abuse or financial instability.
Section 09
Rights, risk & safeguards
Financial innovation requires trust, due process and human accountability.
Risk: Over-indebtedness or unsuitable products Clear disclosure, lawful purpose, data minimisation, audit, human review and remedy required.
Risk: Fraud, exclusion or abusive recovery Clear disclosure, lawful purpose, data minimisation, audit, human review and remedy required.
Risk: Sensitive financial-data misuse Clear disclosure, lawful purpose, data minimisation, audit, human review and remedy required.
Risk: False precision or incentives that weaken financial stability Clear disclosure, lawful purpose, data minimisation, audit, human review and remedy required.
Required No guaranteed-return claim, hidden charge, unsuitable loan, abusive recovery or automatic adverse decision without explanation Users need clear terms, correction, complaint and appeal routes.
Required: AI assists fraud, risk and service review; accountable institutions make consequential decisions Test bias, error, security, explainability and fallback operations.
- PRIORITY 02 / 85
- Access, Identity & Payments
- CORE RULE
Safe access → suitable use → protection → productive outcome → verified public value.
Submit protected evidence ↓