Rs 60,000 Crore Is Sitting in Forgotten Bank Accounts. Here Is How to Find Out If Some of It Is Yours.

An old salary account from a job two cities ago. A fixed deposit an elderly relative opened and never mentioned. A savings account attached to a loan that closed a decade back. None of that money disappears, and none of it becomes the bank’s property. It moves somewhere specific, and it stays claimable.

Where the money goes

A deposit that sees no customer-initiated activity for ten years is classified as an unclaimed deposit, and the balance is transferred to the Reserve Bank’s Depositor Education and Awareness (DEA) Fund.

The scale is the part that surprises people. By 31 January 2026, public sector banks alone had transferred Rs 60,518 crore into the DEA Fund. That figure is not the whole picture either — it excludes private and foreign banks.

The transfer changes custody, not ownership. The depositor, or the legal heir, retains the right to claim it, and that right does not expire with the transfer.

UDGAM: one search across many banks

RBI built UDGAM — Unclaimed Deposits Gateway to Access Information — at udgam.rbi.org.in precisely because the alternative was contacting every bank an account might conceivably be with. It covers a large set of participating banks accounting for the bulk of DEA Fund balances.

Using it is free. There is no charge to search, and no charge to claim.

How to search

1. Register on the portal with your mobile number and set a password.
2. Search by name, and where you have them, additional identifiers.
3. Search the variants. This is where most searches fail. Accounts opened decades ago carry initials, maiden names, expanded middle names, or a spelling a clerk chose. Try each form you might once have banked under.
4. Search for deceased relatives if you are a legal heir — a substantial share of these balances belong to people who are no longer alive to look.

Claiming what you find

The claim itself is made at the bank, not on the portal — the portal is a locator. You approach the branch with proof of identity and proof of your entitlement to the account, and the bank processes the claim, drawing the money back from the DEA Fund where it has already been transferred.

For a claim as a legal heir, expect to establish the chain: the death certificate, your relationship, and whatever succession document the bank’s policy requires for the amount involved. Nomination, where it exists, makes this dramatically simpler — which is the argument for checking the nomination status on every account you currently hold.

A warning that matters here more than anywhere

A public database of unclaimed money attracts operators offering to “recover” it for a percentage. There is nothing for them to do. The search is free, the claim is made by you at your own bank, and no intermediary has access or standing that you do not. Anyone asking for a fee, an advance, or your banking credentials to process an unclaimed-deposit claim should be treated accordingly.

How to use this page

This page describes rules published by the Reserve Bank of India, IRDAI or NPCI, identified by instrument and date so you can verify them yourself. It is general information about those rules, not advice on your particular dispute, and your bank’s or insurer’s own policy document governs the specifics of your account or policy.

Nobody should charge you to claim what is yours

Every process described here is free and can be started by you directly. No agent, consultant or “recovery service” can obtain an outcome you cannot obtain yourself, and none is required at any stage. Oquilia takes no fee from readers, offers no recovery service, and refers no one to any legal practice or intermediary.

If the rule was not followed

Escalate in order: the entity’s own grievance channel first, then the RBI Ombudsman via cms.rbi.org.in for banks, NBFCs and payment systems, or the Insurance Ombudsman for insurers. Complaints to the ombudsman are free, and you do not need a lawyer to file one.