Modi pledges bank accounts for all Indians

NEW DELHI, Aug 15: Prime Minister Narendra Modi set out plans Friday to ensure all Indians can have a bank account, blaming the high level of suicides among farmers on their inability to pay back money-lenders. "Why are our farmers committing suicide? It's because they have to take money at huge interest rates from the money-lenders," he said in a speech on India's independence day. "We will have a prime minister's people wealth scheme so that even the poorest of the poor can have a bank account of their own," Modi said. He said that his Bharatiya Janata Party government, which came to power in May, would set up a scheme to provide farmers with special guarantees in exceptional circumstances worth up to 100,000 rupees (around 1,650 dollars).     — AFP