The Indian postal department is a veritable behemoth, with a network of about 155,000 post offices, the largest in the world. Nearly 90% of these post offices are in rural areas and it is estimated that on average each serves an area of 21.22 kilometres and a population of 8354 people. India Post therefore appears to be a natural ally for the Indian government and the banking industry regulator in their efforts to improve financial inclusion. Nearly 40% of India's population of 1.3 billion is unbanked, a significant proportion of which resides in remote rural areas that banks have struggled to penetrate. And apart from its vast reach, India Post's Post Office Savings Bank (POSB), which operates small savings schemes on behalf of India's Ministry of Finance, has more than 330 million account holders. At the end of March 2015, the outstanding balance of all savings schemes was more than Rs6l90bn ($92.1bn), nearly half the size of deposits held by the largest bank in the country, State Bank of India (SBI).
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