With 30 million Indians living abroad and the number still growing, money remittance services have huge market potential as banks have only five per cent rural presence in the country, added minister of state for communications, Sachin Pilot.

"India Post has long been in international money transfer service through its traditional paper-based money order service to many countries The social relevance of India Post has gained momentum in the recent past through active participation of post offices in disbursement of wages to the rural poor under the Mahatma Gandhi National Employment Guarantee (MNEGR) Scheme throughout the country," Radhika Doraiswamy, secretary, department of posts, said.

Meanwhile, Manjula Prasher, member (operations and technology), Postal Services Board, said "all departmental post offices numbering around 25,000, which are already computerised, are expected to be covered under core banking solution (CBS) by 2012-13."

"Plans are afoot to provide Rural ICT to all 1.3 lakh branch post offices in the country," she added.

"MoneyGram's teaming with India Post reaffirms the company's commitment to serving its hundreds of thousands of customers in the world's largest remittance market and the value MoneyGram brings India Post's business and customers. Bringing India Post, one of the world's largest postal services to our network, is very exciting," Harsh Lambah, MoneyGram' senior regional director for South Asia, said.

MoneyGram International is a leading global money transfer company offering money transfer services worldwide through a global network of more than 244,000 agent locations - including retailers, international post offices and financial institutions - in 192 countries and territories around the world.