Introduction
In September 2025, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) issued a clear and time-bound directive to scheduled commercial banks across the country: return over ₹67,000 crore in unclaimed deposits within three months. These funds, which have been lying dormant in banks for over a decade, reflect savings and investments that depositors or their heirs have not claimed.
According to official data presented in Parliament, ₹67,270 crore in unclaimed deposits had accumulated by June 2025, with nearly 87 per cent of these funds held by public sector banks. The State Bank of India alone accounts for close to ₹19,330 crore, followed by Punjab National Bank and Canara Bank, each with over ₹6,000 crore. Among private banks, ICICI Bank leads with over ₹2,000 crore in unclaimed deposits.
The central bank has set a strict three-month window—from October to December 2025—for institutions to intensify their efforts to trace account holders or their heirs.
What Are Unclaimed Deposits?
Unclaimed deposits are amounts parked in bank accounts or term deposits that remain untouched for ten years or more. If there are no customer-initiated transactions, such as withdrawals, deposits, or instructions, over this period, the account is treated as inoperative.
By regulation, once these deposits cross the dormancy threshold, they are transferred by banks to the Depositor Education and Awareness (DEA) Fund maintained by the RBI. The intent behind this framework is to protect idle money from misuse and to ensure that rightful owners or their heirs can claim it at any point through a structured process.
Despite these measures, the scale of the problem is enormous. The funds in question represent both financial assets forgotten by individuals and systemic gaps in outreach. Many heirs are unaware of accounts held by deceased relatives, and in other cases, documentation gaps make it difficult for claimants to establish ownership.
The Scale Of Unclaimed Deposits
The RBI’s disclosure puts the size of unclaimed deposits at ₹67,270 crore as of June 2025. Public sector banks dominate this pool, reflecting their large customer base and legacy operations. Here are a few of the banks with their unclaimed deposits:
Bank | Unclaimed Deposits (₹ crore) |
State Bank of India (SBI) | 19,329.29 |
Punjab National Bank (PNB) | 6,910.67 |
Canara Bank | 6,278.14 |
Bank of Baroda | 5,277.36 |
Union Bank of India | 5,104.50 |
ICICI Bank | 2,063.45 |
Other Private Banks (combined) | 8,673.72 |
Total (All Banks) | 67,270 |
RBI’s Instructions To Banks
The Reserve Bank of India has issued time-bound instructions to banks, directing them to intensify efforts between October and December 2025 to return unclaimed deposits.
Key Directives From The RBI
Special Outreach Drive (Oct–Dec 2025):
Banks have been asked to run a targeted campaign over three months to trace account holders or their heirs. The focus will be on proactive engagement rather than passive compliance.Role Of State Level Bank Committees (SLBCs):
SLBCs are required to review progress at a granular level, breaking down data by region and age of deposit, and ensuring that lagging banks step up their efforts.Public Awareness Measures:
Banks must reach out to customers through various media, including print, electronic, and digital channels, with a special focus on rural and semi-urban areas where awareness levels are often lower.Grievance Redressal:
Institutions must strengthen grievance redressal mechanisms to ensure that claimants face fewer procedural hurdles when retrieving funds.UDGAM Portal:
A central plank of this drive is the UDGAM (Unclaimed Deposits – Gateway to Access Information) portal maintained by the RBI. This digital platform allows individuals to search for unclaimed deposits across multiple banks using simple identifiers such as their name, PAN, or address.
As of July 2025, nearly 8.6 lakh users had registered, and the portal now covers banks that account for around 90% of unclaimed deposit value.
Challenges In Returning Dormant Deposits
While the RBI’s directive is clear and time-bound, executing it on the ground poses significant challenges. The sheer magnitude of ₹67,270 crore in dormant funds means banks must overcome structural, operational, and human barriers to reunite depositors with their money.
Tracing The Rightful Owners
One of the greatest hurdles lies in locating the original depositors or their heirs. Over time, customers may have moved houses, migrated abroad, or passed away, leaving no clear trail for banks to follow. Inheritance complexities add another layer of difficulty, especially in the absence of updated nominee information.
Documentation And Proof
Even when claimants are identified, retrieving deposits often hinges on producing valid documents such as identity proofs, succession certificates, or death certificates of deceased account holders. In many cases, these documents are either missing or difficult to obtain, delaying the process.
Awareness And Financial Literacy Gaps
A large proportion of dormant deposits belong to individuals in rural and semi-urban regions. Limited awareness of banking rules, lack of digital access, and low financial literacy mean that many potential claimants are unaware of their rights or the steps required to reclaim funds.
Operational Inefficiencies
Banks themselves face operational bottlenecks. Branch-level staff may not always have updated contact information, and in some cases, the processes for claim settlement remain manual, cumbersome, and time-consuming.
Risk Of Fraudulent Claims
Efforts to return unclaimed deposits must also be safeguarded against fraudulent attempts, where impostors may try to exploit gaps in verification mechanisms. This necessitates robust verification tools that can balance customer convenience with security.
The Scale of the Challenge
As per RBI’s directive, banks must return ₹67,000 crore lying in dormant accounts within 3 month
These deposits, untouched for over a decade, often belong to individuals who:
Have changed residences or migrated abroad.
Passed away without clear nominee details.
Remain unaware of their dormant accounts, especially in rural or semi-urban areas.
Traditional outreach methods — phone calls or emails — often fail. Contact numbers are outdated, email addresses bounce, and in many cases, families are unaware of the accounts at all. Simply shutting the account isn’t enough; banks must first trace and credit the rightful customer or heir.
AuthBridge’s Role: From Tracing To Compliance
When banks are pressed to act fast and at scale, mere promises don’t suffice. What matters is whether a solution can deliver across jurisdictions, risk tiers, connectivity constraints, and fraud vectors. AuthBridge’s address and contact point verification stack is built to meet exactly those demands. Below is a close look at the services.
At AuthBridge, we specialise in bridging the gap between compliance requirements and customer realities:
1. Skip Tracing For Account Closure
We leverage alternate data sources — credit bureau, utility, and telecom records — to trace rightful owners or heirs when contact details are missing.
2. Mobile-To-Address API (Powered by Shiprocket)
Our mobile-to-address API helps confirm and enrich contact data, scoring addresses against 12–13 trusted sources including national ID repositories. This accelerates discovery when customers cannot be reached directly.
3. Address Augmentation & Verification
Using mobile numbers, we link multiple data points to verify and augment addresses, reducing false positives and ensuring accurate outreach.
4. Re-KYC & Claimant Verification
Through video KYC, name screening, and account verification, we help banks securely re-onboard dormant customers or verify claimants before settlement.
5. Hybrid Approach: Digital + On-Ground
Where needed, our field verification teams complement digital workflows, ensuring even rural or hard-to-reach customers are traced effectivel
Conclusion
The RBI’s call to return ₹67,270 crore in unclaimed deposits within three months is both a challenge and an opportunity for banks. Success will depend on how effectively institutions can trace rightful claimants while safeguarding against fraud and delay. Digital tools such as AuthBridge’s Digital Address Verification (DAV) and GroundCheck.ai provide a practical answer—enabling banks to verify addresses in minutes, escalate seamlessly to on-ground checks when required, and build a transparent audit trail at every step. By adopting these solutions, banks not only stand to meet the RBI’s directive on time but also send a clear message of trust, accountability, and customer commitment.
