* Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular given provisionalapproval
* Reliance Industries, billionaire Shanghvi also among 11winners
* India central bank says will give more permits in future (Adds details on winners)
MUMBAI, Aug 19 (Reuters) - India's leading mobile carriersBharti Airtel Ltd and Vodafone India wereamong 11 companies selected by the country's central bank tohelp set up "payments banks" aimed at granting millions ofcitizens access to basic banking.
Energy-to-telecoms conglomerate Reliance Industries Ltd, controlled by India's richest man Mukesh Ambani,which plans to set up a payments bank in a partnership with toplender State Bank of India, was among the winners.
Payments banks will be able to take deposits and remittancesbut will not be allowed to lend. They are part of India'sfinancial inclusion push, meant to bring banking services to acountry where less half the adult population has a bank account.
The aim is for payments banks to piggy-back on existingretail or other networks.
Dilip Shanghvi, the second-richest Indian, was also amongthose who won a permit.
The country's postal office, and a joint venture of AdityaBirla Nuvo Ltd and third largest Indian cellphonecarrier Idea Cellular were among others selected bythe Reserve Bank of India.(http://bit.ly/1hMiyRB)
Fino PayTech Ltd and Cholamandalam Distribution ServicesLtd, which already work with banks as agents or distributefinancial products were also given provisional approval.
The companies selected will be given "in-principle" approvalfor 18 months, after which they will be given licences if theyfulfil all conditions stipulated by the RBI, the central banksaid on Wednesday.
A total of 41 companies had applied for the permit, the RBIsaid, adding "some of the entities who did not qualify in thisround, could well be successful in future rounds."
Vijay Shekhar Sharma, founder of mobile wallet servicesprovider PayTM that is partly owned by Alibaba's Ant Financial,was also selected. India's fifth-biggest software exporter TechMahindra was also named among the winners. (Reporting by Devidutta Tripathy; Editing by Rafael Nam andKeith Weir)