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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | ‘Financial inclusion a result of overall exclusion'

‘Financial inclusion a result of overall exclusion'

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published Published on Oct 24, 2010   modified Modified on Oct 24, 2010

Eminent economist and Vice-Chairman of the Kerala State Planning Board Prabhat Patnaik said on Saturday that the euphoria in official circles over financial inclusion has risen because of the “systematic scaling down of institutional credit to the peasantry and other productive sectors in the last two decades”. Delivering the centenary lecture dedicated to the memory of Prabhat Kar, a pioneer of the trade union movement in the banking industry, Mr. Patnaik said, “The talk of inclusion is happening against a backdrop of overall exclusion.” The lecture was organised by the All India Bank Employees' Association and the All India Bank Officers' Association.

Speaking on the ‘Social Function of Banks', Mr. Patnaik said the proportion of agricultural credit to total credit disbursed by banks, which had risen dramatically after bank nationalisation in 1969, started falling dramatically after liberalisation. He said the “measures” of inclusion being considered are likely to “willy-nilly bring in moneylender-like actors into the picture”. He said the idea of banks recruiting banking correspondents to extend their reach is likely to introduce intermediaries who will act as moneylenders. “We are merely creating a class of modern moneylenders,” he remarked.

Telling trend

The recent reports about the “enormous repressive power wielded by microfinance agents against borrowers indicates the manner in which moneylenders can terrorise peasants and other borrowers,” Mr. Patnaik said.

Arguing against the widespread notion that banks are merely “middlemen between savers and investors”, Mr. Patnaik said, “Credit drives savings and investment, not the other way around.” Banks can finance credit without having any access to savings because they can borrow from the Central bank, he observed.

“Since banks create command over capital by determining which sector or social group will get access to credit, society must control banks,” he argued.

“Neoliberal policy makers,” Mr. Patnaik said, “no longer talk about the national economy, but about the Indian economy as being attached to the globalised system of finance capital.” He congratulated the workers in the banking industry for “not allowing the policy makers to go as far as they would have liked”.


The Hindu, 24 October, 2010, http://www.hindu.com/2010/10/24/stories/2010102457730500.htm


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