India Needs More Banks to Double Credit-to-GDP Ratio to 100%, Says RBI Board Member

India needs more banks for sustaining high growth and doubling the credit-to-GDP ratio to 100 per cent, RBI board member Manish Sabharwal said on Tuesday. Sabharwal, who is the chairman of Teamlease Services, also said the country needs immediate reforms in banking, compliance, labour laws and education because “hope is not a strategy”. He was addressing a virtual conference organised by the All India Management Association (AIMA).

India needs to increase its credit-to-GDP ratio from 50 per cent to 100 per cent and it requires more banks, albeit with better regulation, an AIMA statement quoted Sabharwal as saying. Speaking about economic recovery, he said various sectors are in different stages of improvement. The FMCG sector is back to 100 per cent, whereas hotel, airlines and construction segments have a long way to go, he said.

COVID-19 has created great business opportunities, but not everybody is in a position to raise funds, he noted. He pointed out that bank credit, venture capital and private equity funding had slowed down since March but it is a great opportunity for those who are in a position to raise funds to acquire assets.

On the issue of stimulus package, he said it would be “wrong to throw money from the helicopter”, and the right thing would be to create a better environment for entrepreneurship through reforms. “This is a time to build for the next quarter-century and not for the next quarter,” he said.