In August 2023, the Indian central bank had announced the development of a web portal to allow depositors to search across multiple banks for any unclaimed deposits. (File Photo)The quantum of unclaimed deposits with Indian banks stood at Rs 67,003 crore as at the end of the June quarter, with State Bank of India (SBI) accounting for 29 per cent of all such deposits, the Finance Ministry told Parliament on Monday.According to data shared by Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary in response to a question in the Lok Sabha, 87 per cent of all unclaimed deposits were with public sector banks. Of the total unclaimed deposits of Rs 58,330.26 crore with state-owned lenders, Rs 19,329.92 crore was with SBI.The other public sector banks with sizeable chunks of unclaimed deposits include Punjab National Bank (Rs 6,910.67 crore), Canara Bank (Rs 6,278.14 crore), Bank of Baroda (Rs 5,277.36 crore), and Union Bank of India (Rs 5,104.50 crore).Private banks, on the other hand, held unclaimed deposits of Rs 8,673.72 crore, with ICICI Bank in possession of the most, at Rs 2,063.45 crore.Money in savings and current accounts that have not been operated for 10 years or term deposits not claimed within 10 years from the date of maturity are called unclaimed deposits. These funds are, after the expiry of the 10-year threshold, moved to the Depositor Education and Awareness Fund maintained by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).In a separate Parliament question in March, data from the Finance Ministry had shown that the amounts of unclaimed deposits rose sharply starting 2022-23. In the previous three years, the annual additions to the Depositor Education and Awareness Fund were slightly more than Rs 4,500 crore on average. However, in 2022-23, this almost tripled to Rs 12,254.29 crore before edging down slightly to Rs 11,794.17 crore in 2023-24. The pace was somewhat maintained in the first nine months of 2024-25, with Rs 7,946.49 crore being transferred to the Depositor Education and Awareness Fund.Seemingly in response to the rise in unclaimed deposits, the RBI had in June 2023 started a ‘100 Days 100 Pays’ campaign for banks to trace and settle the 100 largest unclaimed deposits of every bank in every district of the country within 100 days.Story continues below this adSubsequently, in August 2023, the Indian central bank had announced the development of a web portal to allow depositors to search across multiple banks for any unclaimed deposits. The portal, called UDGAM – Unclaimed Deposits- Gateway to Access Information – had more than 8.5 lakh registered users as on July 1, Chaudhary said on Monday.Siddharth Upasani is a Deputy Associate Editor with The Indian Express. He reports primarily on data and the economy, looking for trends and changes in the former which paint a picture of the latter. Before The Indian Express, he worked at Moneycontrol and financial newswire Informist (previously called Cogencis). Outside of work, sports, fantasy football, and graphic novels keep him busy. ... Read More© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd