Revamped Kisan Vikas Patra to be launched early next month

NEW DELHI: The government is likely to launch the revamped Kisan Vikas Patra ( KVP) early next month and may garner about Rs20,000 crore worth investments in the remaining months of the current fiscal.

“All the paper work is complete. We hope to launch the revamped KVP early next month,” a senior finance ministry official said.

The official further said that even though half the fiscal is over, the government could garner about s Rs20,000 crore from the KVP in the current fiscal ending March.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in Budget had said he will re-introduce the KVP, which was a very popular instrument among small savers.

“I plan to reintroduce the instrument to encourage people, who may have banked and unbanked savings to invest in this instrument,” Jaitley had said.The KVP was discontinued by the UPA government in 2011 following the Shyamala Gopinath Committee report. It had suggested that KVPs may be discontinued as they are prone to misuse being a bearer-like instruments. KVP was a very popular saving scheme that doubled the money invested in eight years and seven months.

The government sold these saving bonds through Post Offices in the country.