Guwahati, July 26: The RBI banking ombudsman in the Northeast today said complaints from the region are very few compared to other places of the country.

The Banking Ombudsman Scheme (2006) was introduced to resolve complaints relating to certain services rendered by banks.

During 2015-16 (July 2015-June 2016), the office of banking ombudsman, Guwahati, received a total of 1,328 complaints as against 1,054 complaints the previous year - an increase of 26 per cent.

"I am definitely not happy and want more complaints. As compared to other centres across the country, the Northeast must obviously be at the tail-end," Anindita Bhattacharya, RBI Banking Ombudsman for the Northeast, said at a news conference here today.

The office of the banking ombudsman, Guwahati, looks after Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura.

She said the increase of 26 per cent is attributed to the awareness campaigns by the office in various areas under its jurisdiction, besides advertisements in the media.

Assam accounted for 61 per cent of the complaints received with Manipur a distant second with 7 per cent while Mizoram received 0.60 per cent complaints.

Awareness campaigns have been stepped up throughout the year to reach out to people in remote areas to get a much higher number of complaints.

Bhattacharya said the complaints received from rural and semi-urban areas together comprised 53 per cent of the total complaints in 2015-16 as against 48 per cent last year.

The largest proportion of complaints (39 per cent) were received on grounds of non- adherence to fair practices code and failure to meet commitments by banks.

She said the office in Guwahati had a high overall rate of disposal of cases, which stood at 97.25 per cent, carrying forward only 37 per cent complaints. "Another noticeable trend was that the banking ombudsman settled a large proportion (one third) of the complaints by conciliation/mediation between the complainant and the banks' representatives."