Sukanya Samridhi Account

      Many of you may be aware of Central Government's "Sukanya Samridhi Account" - a savings scheme that was launched on 22nd January 2015. Couple of days back, it has been launched in Tamilnadu and Pondicherry, and many are struggling to get the right information/clarification concerning this scheme. In this connection, there was a "Live" program on "Thanthi TV" - a Satellite Tamil channel on 28th March at 15:00 hours IST, in which the Chennai region's Postmaster General Mr. Mervin Alexander was answering various questions/doubts. I thought that writing an article based on the information/clarification I have gathered, would be useful to many. I was/am very cautious in NOT misleading on any information/clarification given here; but, still... if there is any, by chance, it may be because of the fact that I did not understand it well. Please let me know if there is any so. 

Conditions/ Criteria:

• Sukanya Samridhi Account (SSA) savings scheme is essentially for a girl child, and only one account can be opened in the credit of a particular girl child. If there are more than one account found on a particular child, it may lead to legal actions. However, I do not have enough details on the legal actions.
• Only 2 girl children are eligible per family to get benefited from this scheme. However, if the 2nd pregnancy has delivered twin or multiple girl-children, they are eligible to get benefitted along with the 1st girl child, if applicable. But, if the twin/multiple girl children are born in the 1st pregnancy, the girl(s) born in the next or consequence pregnancies becomes ineligible.
• The SSA can be opened with a minimum of 1000 INR per account/per year; and the maximum limit is 1,50,000 INR per account/per year. The year related with SSA is the "Financial Year", which means from April-March. As today is 29th March, the current financial year will end in 2 days, and if one wants, any amount (even the maximum) can be deposited for the 1st year within these 2 days.
• Maximum deposition period is 14 years and then the amount can be kept in the account for 7 years to get complete maturity of the scheme. This means the total life-span of SSA scheme is 21 years. But, the account can be closed at any time if necessary but the maturity/returns will differ accordingly. 
• There is no condition on how much should be paid for a year, and also there is no fixed amount to be followed for all the 14 years. It can be vary from year to year; and the only condition is that it cannot exceed a maximum amount of 1,50,000 INR per account per year. Deposits can be made either in lump-sum or in 12 installments
• The amount can be paid for the maximum of 14 years from the date of opening SSA or until the girl is got married, whichever comes first. After the completion of 14 years deposition or getting married, no more deposition will be possible.
• In the case of the girl getting married, only further deposit will not be possible; but, the deposit can be kept alive for the remaining years to get the complete maturity depending on the deposited amount. 
• If for any reason, one or more years are passed without any deposit after opening the SSA, the account can be brought to alive by paying 50 INR per year. Personally, I am against this penalty that is very feeble; it may make the people a bit more careless. Anyway, it is my personal opinion.

Eligibility:

• A girl child with the age from just-born to less than 10 completed years (on the day of opening SSA) are eligible under SSA scheme. However, as a launching-year promotion, one more year is allowed as far as the upper age limit is concerned. According to this, a girl child who is not exceeding 11 completed years of age on/before 2nd December 2015 can be eligible for this scheme. It seems, at least for now, that this relaxation will not be applicable from next year.

Benefits/Maturity:

• All the amount deposited to this scheme are exempted from tax payments. Further information can be obtained from Department of Tax.
• If 14 years are completed with a maximum deposit of 1,50,000 INR per year, plus 7 years of keeping the account alive; the total maturity is understood to be 79,00,000 INR. That is after completing 21 years from the date of opening SSA.
• Any deposit below the maximum per year will have the total maturity in proportional to the amount paid.
• Before the actual completion of 21 years, 50 % of the amount can be availed for either higher education of the marriage of the girl. However, it was not explained if this 50 % is exactly half of the total-maturity amount.

Opening and maintaining SSA?:

• Either Parents/Natural guardians/Legal guardians of the girl child are only eligible to open SSA on the credit of a particular girl child. A passport-size photograph and any document like AADHAR card holding the address proof of "Parents/Natural guardians/Legal guardians" are needed to open SSA. It seems some post-office branches are asking for the photograph of the child, which is not mandatory.
• Once the account is opened, any one can make deposit to it.
• Once the girl having SSA completed 10 years, she can go to post-office and deposit the amount by signing herself. 
• After 18 years, it will become mandatory that the girl handles and maintains the SSA by herself. Also on completing 18 years, the photo and address proof the girl should be submitted, which is mandatory. 

Where to apply?:

• For now, SSA can be opened ONLY by applying at post offices including a branch office. However, at later stage the facilities will be made to open this account through banks and/or by online. More details will be available in later stages.
• The same is applied to topping the account; means, for now, it can be done ONLY at post offices. However, other facilities like online payments will be made available at later stages.

Contacts:

• Any further information/clarification can be obtained from these numbers: +91 44 28594745 and +91 94430 48028. Both are Chennai based numbers and I do not have any other contact at the moment.
• This http://www.indiapost.gov.in/SukanyaSamriddhi.aspx weblink may be useful in getting some more information. 

Male child:

• If one wonders, why NOT for male child? - there is already a scheme named "Public Provident Fund (PPF)" that is for male children or by other means uni-sex. The only difference is that SSA gives an interest of 9.1 % against 8.7 % in PPF. This 0.4 % of interest is because that they are girl children, which are precious for any country.

NOTE: If you felt this article was useful, please spend a moment in sharing this with others in your circle. Let all the girl children of our country be benefitted from this scheme.

Link to Tamil Version: http://vizhiyappan.blogspot.ae/2015/03/sukanya-samridhi-account.html