Savings
Punjab National Bank RD rates: the FD card, minus the buckets an RD cannot reach
PNB prices an RD at its FD card rate, so the RD peak is 6.35% at 37 to 60 months; the 444-day 6.60% is out of reach. Default fee, closure penalty and senior bands.
Punjab National Bank does not publish a recurring-deposit rate card. Its RD page says the rate “would be card rate as applicable to all the tenors of deposit as displayed on website”, so the term-deposit schedule effective 1 June 2026 prices every RD — but only at the tenures an RD can be booked at, which are whole months from 6 to 120. That rules out the 444-day bucket where the FD card peaks at 6.60%. The best rate a PNB RD can reach is 6.35% for the general public on any tenure from 37 to 60 months, 6.85% for depositors aged 60 to 79 and 7.15% for those aged 80 and above. Twelve months pays 6.25%, and anything beyond five years pays 6.00%.
Rates below are read from PNB’s deposit-rate page and its RD scheme page on 10 September 2026 and apply to resident domestic deposits below ₹3 crore. The RD page carries no effective date of its own; the card it points to is dated 1 June 2026, and that date controls. Confirm the rate on the booking screen.
What an RD at PNB actually pays
Because an RD is priced off the FD card, the schedule below is PNB’s term-deposit table folded onto month-long tenures. Where several FD buckets fall inside one range of months and pay the same, they are collapsed into one row.
| RD tenure | General | Age 60–79 | Age 80+ |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6 to 11 months | 5.60% | 6.10% | 6.40% |
| — except exactly 303 days (ten months from a February or September start, where the term does not cross a 29 February) | 5.55% | 6.05% | 6.35% |
| 12 months exactly | 6.25% | 6.75% | 7.05% |
| 13 to 36 months | 6.30% | 6.80% | 7.10% |
| 37 to 60 months | 6.35% | 6.85% | 7.15% |
| 61 to 120 months | 6.00% | 6.80% | 6.80% |
The RD page sets the minimum instalment at ₹100 a month and thereafter in multiples of ₹1, the maximum at ₹25 lakh per customer per month, and the tenure at “between 6 months to 120 months in multiple of 1 months”.
For orientation, PNB’s savings rate is 2.50% a year on balances up to ₹100 crore, effective 1 October 2025. Even the shortest RD pays 3.10 percentage points more than that, which is the whole case for the product.
The buckets an RD cannot reach, and the one it can
The FD card has six single-day rows — 155, 303, 390, 444, 666 and 1,204 days — and only 303 is a length an RD can reach. Fourteen months is roughly 425 days and fifteen roughly 456, so 444 days sits between two RD tenures that both pay 6.30%; the 666-day bucket at 6.50% falls between 21 and 22 months in the same way. Missing 390 costs nothing: it is priced at 6.30%, like the band around it. Landing on 303 costs five basis points — ten months can run to exactly 303 days, which it does from a February or September start that misses 29 February, and the card prices it at 5.55% against 5.60% either side. An RD saver is paying 0.25 percentage point less than the FD card’s best rate, and no tenure choice recovers it.
₹5,000 a month for five years
Take ₹5,000 a month for 60 months at 6.35%. The instalments total ₹3,00,000 and the maturity value is about ₹3,53,600, so the deposit earns roughly ₹53,600 of interest. At the 6.85% senior rate the maturity value is about ₹3,58,300; at 7.15%, about ₹3,61,100. Those figures use quarterly compounding, each instalment earning from the month it is paid and simple interest within the quarter — the rest PNB’s deposit policy applies to term deposits and names for an RD closed early or maturing with instalments outstanding. PNB’s own calculator may differ by a few rupees on the intra-quarter convention; the RD calculator gives the figure for any instalment and tenure.
One caution on PNB’s own pages: the Kalpnidhi page prints an illustrative chart at 6.4% for one-to-four-year deposits and 6.5% at five years, neither of which is the card rate for those tenures. Its 6% for six to ten years matches the card. Treat the chart as arithmetic, not a quote.
The FD card behind this schedule is taken apart bucket by bucket in PNB’s FD rates by tenure, and sits beside six other banks’ cards in our comparison of FD interest rates.
The instalment rules: what a missed month costs
The instalment for any month is due on or before the last working day of that month. Miss it and the bank levies ₹1 per ₹100 per month of delay, “irrespective of periodicity of deposit”, and a fraction of a month is treated as a full month. On a ₹5,000 instalment that is ₹50 for each month it runs late — ₹150 if it is paid three months after its due date, or 1% a month, roughly twice the deposit’s own rate annualised. A late instalment can be paid any time before maturity, and instalments can be paid in advance, though unlike the Post Office scheme PNB publishes no rebate for doing so.
One bounce cancels the standing instruction
The convenient way to run an RD is a standing instruction from a savings or current account, which PNB sets up free of charge. The policy then adds the sentence that matters: if the depositor fails to keep enough balance for the transfer, “the standing instructions would be treated as cancelled and the installment will be deemed to have fallen in arrears”. A single bounce does not cost one month’s fee; it switches the automation off, and every later month falls into arrears until the instruction is set up again.
Maturity, and the month after the last instalment
An RD does not necessarily mature on the date printed at opening. The policy provides that the deposit matures “30 days/one month after payment of last installment or on expiry of period for which the deposit was accepted, whichever is later” — so a final instalment that slips by two months moves the maturity by two months.
Where instalments are still unpaid at maturity, the contracted schedule no longer applies. The RD page says interest is “applied on daily balances with half-yearly compounding”; the deposit policy says simple interest on daily products compounded quarterly. The two documents disagree on the rest and agree that an irregular account is settled on what was actually in it.
The day after maturity is the same cliff as on a fixed deposit: unclaimed proceeds earn the savings-account rate or the contracted rate, whichever is lower — a fall from 6.35% to 2.50% on the 37-to-60-month peak. Give the maturity instruction at opening.
Closing it early
The premature-closure rule is the FD rule applied to a monthly product. The RD page offers “premature withdrawal option available with 1% penal interest”, and the policy spells out what that means: the interest payable is the rate applicable to the amount and the period for which the deposit actually remained with the bank, minus 1%, “and not at the contracted rate”. Closure within the first month earns no interest at all, and closure is entertained only at the base branch where the account is held.
Take the ₹5,000-a-month deposit booked for 60 months at 6.35% and closed after the twenty-fourth instalment. The period actually served is two years, which the card prices at 6.30%; less the penalty, the deposit earns 5.30%. On the ₹1,20,000 paid in, that is about ₹6,800 of interest against roughly ₹8,200 at the contracted rate — a gap of about ₹1,400, almost all of it the 1%. Both figures use the quarterly method above, which the policy names for an RD “sought to be withdrawn before due date”.
Staff members and senior citizens are exempt from the 1% levy, other than on deposits accepted at a differential rate of interest, and so is a closure following the depositor’s death. The exemption does not restore the contracted rate: the senior depositor in the example is rebuilt to the two-year senior rate of 6.80% and loses only a few tens of rupees against the 6.85% contract. For everyone else the alternative to closing is a loan: PNB lends against an RD “as are being allowed against Fixed Deposits”, marking a lien on the full balance, though neither the RD page nor the policy states the margin or the rate. When a loan beats a closure is worked through in our page on a loan against an FD.
Seniors, and the 80-plus band
The RD page carries the same two sentences as the FD card. Depositors aged 60 and above but below 80 get 50 basis points over the card rate on tenures up to five years and 80 basis points beyond; depositors aged 80 and above get 80 basis points on every bucket.
| Category | Uplift over the card rate | 37–60 months | 61–120 months |
|---|---|---|---|
| Age 60 to under 80 | +50 bps to 5 years, +80 bps beyond | 6.85% | 6.80% |
| Age 80 and above | +80 bps, all buckets | 7.15% | 6.80% |
| Retired staff who are senior citizens | the senior uplift on top of the existing 1% staff benefit | — | — |
Up to five years the 80-plus band is worth an extra 30 basis points over an ordinary senior — about ₹2,800 more on the ₹5,000-a-month example. Beyond five years it is worth nothing, because the ordinary senior uplift has already risen to 80 basis points and both bands show 6.80%.
The conditions come from the rate card’s footnotes and the deposit policy. The uplift is not paid on NRO deposits (card footnote), nor on a deposit in the name of the karta of a Hindu Undivided Family even where the karta is a resident senior citizen (policy, section 5(e)). Turning 60 during the deposit does not reprice it; the policy allows the preferential rate on renewal, extension or split, which leaves a running RD on the rate it was booked at.
None of this makes a PNB RD the best home for a retiree’s surplus. The Senior Citizens Savings Scheme pays 8.2% for the quarter ending 30 September 2026, sovereign and paid quarterly, under a ₹30 lakh ceiling — but it takes lump sums, not instalments. For genuinely monthly money the comparison is the five-year Post Office RD, which has one rate for everyone and no senior band; it pays 6.7%, read on the National Savings Institute’s recurring-deposit rate table and marked verified in our data. On those figures a PNB senior earns more on a 37-to-60-month RD and the general public earns less. The scheme sits in our post office savings schemes family page and in detail at Post Office RD interest rate.
The variants PNB publishes separately
The ordinary product appears under two names, Recurring Deposit Scheme and PNB Kalpnidhi, with identical terms. Three other pages describe different products.
Swechha Jama Yojna, the flexi RD. You fix a core monthly amount of at least ₹100 and may deposit up to ten times that in any month; the page states the monthly ceiling as ₹2,50,000 per customer and, in the same line, ₹25 lakh as ten times the core, so confirm which applies. The tenure runs from 6 to 60 months, not 120. PNB charges no penalty for a delayed instalment, and interest is “paid half yearly calculated on daily product basis” rather than compounded to maturity. The rate, senior uplift and loan facility are the ordinary RD’s. It suits irregular income; a saver who will pay the same sum every month gives up the tenures beyond five years and the compounding for nothing.
The e-RD is opened through internet banking by an existing customer with an operative savings or current account, and issued only where that account holds a valid PAN. Mode of operation, nomination and the senior preferential rate are inherited from the funding account, and the maturity proceeds return to it. Closure, premature or otherwise, still means a visit to the parent branch.
The special recurring deposit is an employer-opened institutional product with instalments from ₹10 tied to provident-fund deductions; it is not available to an individual at a branch.
Tax takes the next bite
RD interest is taxable at your slab rate as income from other sources, in the year it accrues, whether or not it has been paid to you — a five-year RD usually spreads its interest across six returns.
The old belief that recurring deposits escape TDS is out of date; PNB’s RD page says plainly that TDS applies as per rules. PNB deducts tax once interest across all your term deposits at the bank — fixed and recurring together — crosses ₹50,000 in a financial year, or ₹1,00,000 for a resident senior citizen; 10% where PAN is on record and 20% where it is not. Savings-account interest carries no TDS at all, though it remains fully taxable. Where you have no tax liability at all, PNB’s policy is that no TDS is deducted from depositors who furnish the declaration in Form 121, which replaced Forms 15G and 15H from 1 April 2026. Both age groups must have nil estimated liability and total income below the basic exemption limit. Our guide to tax on FD interest applies unchanged to an RD.
At 6.35% before tax, a depositor in the 30% slab keeps about 4.4% after cess. That is the number to compare with anything else the monthly sum could go into.
Insurance stops at ₹5 lakh per depositor per bank
Deposit insurance covers principal and accrued interest up to ₹5 lakh per depositor per bank, in the same right and capacity, after lawful set-off. The RD balance is not insured separately; it shares the one ₹5 lakh with every FD and savings balance you hold at PNB.
At ₹5,000 a month the five-year deposit matures at about ₹3.5 lakh and stays inside the limit on its own. The instalment at which a 60-month RD at 6.35% reaches ₹5 lakh at maturity is about ₹7,070 — our own arithmetic, not a figure PNB states — and above that, or with other PNB balances alongside, part of the maturity value is uninsured. Joint accounts and different capacities are covered in our page on DICGC deposit insurance.
Before you book
| If you can commit for | The tenure that fits | General rate | The trap next to it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Six months to a year | 6 to 11 months | 5.60% | One more month, to 12, pays 6.25%; ten months can fall on 303 days at 5.55% |
| About a year | 12 months exactly | 6.25% | 13 months pays 6.30% |
| One to three years | 13 to 36 months | 6.30% | Nothing between 13 and 36 months pays more |
| Three to five years | 37 to 60 months | 6.35% | The RD peak; the FD card’s 6.60% is unreachable |
| More than five years | 61 to 120 months | 6.00% | The longest commitment is the worst paid, unless you are over 60 |
Set the tenure in months, read the rate and the maturity date on the confirmation screen, fund the standing instruction before each month end, and give the maturity instruction at opening. If the money will arrive in uneven lumps rather than the same amount every month, book the Swechha Jama Yojna instead and accept its five-year ceiling.
Common questions
Is the PNB RD interest rate the same as the PNB FD rate?
Yes, for the same tenure. PNB publishes no separate RD schedule; its RD page says the rate is the card rate applicable to the tenor as displayed on the website, which is the term-deposit schedule effective 1 June 2026. The catch is that an RD runs in whole months from 6 to 120, so five of the card’s six single-day buckets are out of reach. The 444-day bucket paying 6.60% cannot be booked as an RD. The one exception runs the wrong way: a ten-month RD can land on exactly 303 days, and that row pays 5.55% rather than the 5.60% on either side of it. The best an RD gets is 6.35% for the general public on any tenure from 37 to 60 months, 6.85% for depositors aged 60 to 79 and 7.15% at 80 and above.
What happens if I miss a PNB RD instalment?
Each instalment is due by the last working day of its month. A late one can still be paid any time before maturity, with a charge of ₹1 per ₹100 per month of delay — ₹50 on a ₹5,000 instalment for every month it is late, and a part month counts as a full month. Two further rules bite harder than the fee. If a standing instruction bounces for want of balance, PNB treats the instruction as cancelled, so every later month falls into arrears until you reset it. And if instalments are still unpaid at maturity, the account is settled on its daily balances instead of the contracted schedule.
Can I close a PNB recurring deposit before maturity?
Yes, at the branch where the account is held, not at any branch. The bank rebuilds the rate to the one applicable to the period the money actually stayed, then deducts 1% — the same rule it applies to fixed deposits. Closed within the first month, the deposit earns nothing at all. Senior citizens and staff are exempt from the 1% levy, as is a closure after the depositor's death, but the rebuild still happens. If the need for cash is temporary, PNB also lends against the RD balance, which keeps the contracted rate alive.
Do senior citizens get a higher RD rate at PNB?
Yes, and the uplift follows the FD card exactly. Depositors aged 60 to 79 receive 50 basis points over the card rate on tenures up to five years and 80 basis points beyond five years; those aged 80 and above receive 80 basis points on every bucket. So the 37-to-60-month RD pays 6.85% and 7.15% to the two bands against 6.35% for everyone else, while a 61-to-120-month RD pays 6.80% to both bands against 6.00%. The uplift is not paid on NRO deposits or on a deposit in the name of an HUF karta.
Is TDS deducted on PNB RD interest?
Yes. PNB's RD page states that TDS is applicable as per rules, and the old belief that recurring deposits escape deduction is out of date. Tax is deducted at 10% once interest across all your term deposits at the bank — fixed and recurring, not savings — crosses ₹50,000 in a financial year, or ₹1,00,000 for a resident senior citizen, and at 20% where no PAN is on record. A depositor with nil estimated liability and total income below the basic exemption limit can file Form 121, which replaced Forms 15G and 15H from 1 April 2026, and PNB says it will not deduct against a valid declaration.
What is PNB Swechha Jama Yojna and how is it different from the ordinary RD?
It is PNB's flexi recurring deposit. You fix a core monthly amount of at least ₹100 and may deposit up to ten times that in any month, the tenure runs from 6 to 60 months rather than 120, and PNB charges no penalty for a delayed instalment. Interest is calculated on daily products and paid half-yearly rather than compounded to maturity. The rate is the same card rate, with the same senior uplift. It suits irregular income; a saver who will pay the same sum every month gains nothing from it and loses the tenures beyond five years.
Sources
Rates and rules on this page were read directly from the following sources on the dates shown. Figures change — if you are about to act on one, confirm it at the source.
- PNB Recurring Deposit Scheme — features and terms (card rate as applicable to the tenor; ₹1 per ₹100 per month on delayed instalments)
- Interest Rates — Deposit (domestic term deposits below ₹3 crore, revised w.e.f. 01.06.2026; savings account rate revised w.e.f. 01.10.2025)
- Policy of the Bank for Domestic Resident Rupee Deposits — landing page for the “Policy on Domestic Resident Rupee Deposit and Other Liabilities” PDF (last updated 27.03.2026; recurring deposits at Operational Guidelines para 2, premature withdrawal at para 26)
- Swechha Jama Yojna / Flexi RD Scheme
- PNB Kalpnidhi (Recurring Deposit Scheme) — the RD terms with the bank's illustrative maturity chart
- PNB Recurring Deposit Scheme (e-RD) — internet-banking recurring deposit
- PNB Special Recurring Deposit Product
- Guide to deposit insurance
- National Savings Recurring Deposit Account Scheme — interest rate since inception (last row “1.10.2023 to 30.09.2026 | 6.7”)
- Senior Citizens’ Savings Scheme — interest rate since inception (last row “1.04.2023 to 30.09.2026 | 8.20”)
- Income Tax Department e-Filing portal