MUMBAI: RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra has said that the regulator has left it to individual banks to decide on the extent of minimum balance required and there was no regulatory restriction on that.“What kind of minimum balance required is left to the banks. Some of them have kept Rs 10,000, some Rs 2,000 and some have completely waived it off. This is not within the regulatory domain,” said Malhotra.The governor said this in Gujarat in response to a question from newspersons on ICICI Bank hiking the minimum balance requirement to Rs 50,000 from Rs 10,000 on new bank accounts.Malhotra visited a financial inclusion camp at Gozaria gram panchayat in Mehsana on Monday, to review re-KYC and scheme enrolment efforts. The visit is part of a nationwide gram panchayat-level campaign running till Sept 30. Since July 1, over 1.41 lakh camps have completed re-KYC for 35 lakh accounts.ICICI Bank has said that statutory accounts like basic savings accounts and salary accounts will continue to be opened without a minimum balance requirement. The move is seen to be aimed at increasing the share of current and savings account balances and reduce pressure on operating costs. Sources added that the new savings account was redesigned as a new product, with a host of charges that earlier applied to savings accounts now waived for these accounts.Experts recommend that most account holders – especially those who do not consistently maintain large surpluses – opt for savings accounts with either no minimum balance or a very low requirement.
