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Expert advice: Former Deputy Governor of Reserve Bank of India Usha Thorat at a function organised by Fisat Business School in Kochi on Friday |
KOCHI: Banks have to provide financing resources necessary for the sustained growth trajectory of the Indian economy, said Usha Thorat, former Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of India. She was delivering the maiden lecture of the FISAT Business School (FBS) lecture series in Kochi on Friday. "We are looking at a high growth rate of 8-9% of the Indian economy and banks will have to play an exceedingly important role in facilitating this rate of growth. Such a growth will have to come from the manufacturing and agriculture sectors. But so far our stress has been on the services sector," Thorat said. "Infrastructure and urbanisation will call for huge project financing and this will be another challenge that Indian banking will have to face. Meeting the challenges of globalisation is another task ahead for the Indian banking sector," she said. Thorat also talked about the possibilities that information technology could offer the banking industry. "To achieve broader inclusive growth, banks must leverage technology and put in place a ubiquitous interoperable payment system to increase the efficiency of processes, dealing with millions of clients and to achieve better internal risk management," Thorat said. Noting that people have been investing in gold and real estate instead of monetary savings, she said, "To increase the rate of growth or even sustain current growth rate of the economy, more savings will have to go in the form of financial savings. This would mean that banks must increase their focus on financial inclusion programmes; besides, there would have to be a benign inflationary environment which would be conducive for people to move their savings from real estate and gold to financial savings."
TOI
