Though the Indian banking sector has undergone phase-wise reforms over the past few decades, the banks have to finetune their systems to curb the incidence of frauds in the sector, W.K. Sarwade, president of Indian Commerce Association and Dean, faculty of Commerce and Management at Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University, Aurangabad, has said.
He was delivering the inaugural address at the two-day national conference on ‘Financial Sector Reforms in India’ organised by Gulbarga University here on Friday.
Prof. Sarwade claimed that the public sector banks have suffered losses to the tune of ₹22,585.83 crore due to fraud committed allegedly by Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi, all these accused fled overseas, while the banks only harass poor farmers who fail to repay crop loan.
He opined that the Non-Performing Assets (NPA) are an essential prudential indicator to assess the banking sector’s financial health. The NPA affects operational efficiency. The situation is primarily manifested in the form of high levels of nonperforming loans and their impact on banks.
Through financial reforms, the banks should take measures for the well-functioning of financial systems by maintaining a low rate of loan defaults, which otherwise leads to severe macroeconomic imbalances.
Prof. Sarwade said that the regulators of banks and financial institutions such as Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and Quasi-regulatory institution like national Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), which are delegated with the authority of regulating and developing the financial sector should work in tandem to promote stability and transparency.
V. Prabhu Dev, Director, MQI College on Management, Bengaluru, in his keynote address threw light on how the Indian capital market is taking care of the investors.
Prof. Dayanand Agsar, Vice-Chancellor of Gulbarga University presided over the conference.
