Senior citizens’ high interest rate regime continues
View(s):High interest rates for senior citizens who have invested their life’s savings in fixed deposits in banks and financial institutions will not be reduced even though bank rates had fallen to a low level, Finance Ministry sources said.
The Central Bank has not issued any guidelines changing interest rates of fixed or a fixed deposits as the Treasury is reimbursing the additional costs incurred by banks in maintaining the maximum interest rate of 15-12 percent for special fixed deposit accounts of senior citizens even almost six years after its introduction in the 2015 budget, a senior official of the ministry said.
Although bank rates have fallen sharply after the government’s action to increase the liquidity in the market and bring down the reserve ratio of deposits of commercial banks, the high interest for senior citizens is still intact, he added.
Current bank interest rates of fixed deposits of senior citizens, outside the special high interest rate scheme of 15 percent, have plunged to 5-6.5 percent from 8-12 percent previously.