Driving inclusive growth: Analyzing financial inclusion policies and frameworks
Keywords:
financial exclusion, financial inclusion, inclusive growth, policy analysis, self-help groupsAbstract
Inclusive growth focuses on equal and equitable development, by particularly mainstreaming the marginalized, vulnerable and underprivileged sections of society, such as rural poor women. Financial inclusion is considered as the keystone to accelerate inclusive growth. This manuscript aims to analyze the policy and institutional framework to promote financial inclusion in India. It also analyses the definition, measurement, outcomes and challenges to financial inclusion. The methodology adopted in this paper is that of document review. Relevant policy documents, internet sources, books, journal articles, research reports and other published material has referred to for carrying out this research. The findings of this study disclose that numbers of institutions are working in the financial inclusion space, namely the Planning Commission, Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Ministry of Finance, Regional Rural Banks (RRBs), NABARD, Cooperative banks, Commercial banks, Primary Agricultural Credit Societies, Micro-Finance Institutions and NGOs. This study provides some useful implications for policymakers and practitioners. It also directs researchers to carry out empirical studies on financial inclusion.
References
Abu-Bader, Suleiman, and Aamer S. Abu-Qarn. 2008. “Financial Development and Economic Growth: The Egyptian Experience.” Journal of Policy Modeling 30 (5): 887–98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpolmod.2007.02.001.
Allen, Franklin, Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Leora Klapper, and Maria Soledad Martinez Peria. 2016. The Foundations of Financial Inclusion: Understanding Ownership and Use of Formal Accounts. Journal of Financial Intermediation. Vol. 27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfi.2015.12.003.
APMAS. 2005. “SHG Bank Linkage Programme: A Study in Andhra Pradesh.” Andhra Pradesh Mahila Abhivruddhi Society Hyderabad. http://www.apmas.org/studies.aspx.
Arora, Sangeeta, and Meenu. 2011. “Women Empowerment Through Microfinance Intervention in the Commercial Banks.” International Journal of Economics and Research 02 (02): 35–45.
Aynsley, and Helen. 2010. “Financial Inclusion and Financial Capability : What ’ s in a Name ?” Toynbee Hall. http://www.toynbeehall.org.uk/data/files/Services/Financial_Inclusion/Financial_Inlcusion_and_Capability_-_Whats_In_A_Name.pdf%0Ahttp://www.toynbeehall.org.uk/research-archive.
Bansal, Shashank. 2014. “Perspective of Technology in Achieving Financial Inclusion in Rural India.” Procedia Economics and Finance 11: 472–80.
Beck, Thorsten, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt, and Patrick Honohan. 2009. “Access to Financial Services: Measurement, Impact, and Policies.” World Bank Research Observer 24 (1): 119–45. https://doi.org/10.1093/wbro/lkn008.
Becker, Gary S. 1975. “Human Capital, A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis with Special Reference to Education.” The National Bureau of Economic Research, NEW YORK. https://doi.org/10.2307/3499575.
Bruhn, M., and Inessa Love. 2009. “The Economic Impact of Banking the Unbanked: Evidence from Mexico.” World Bank Policy Research Working Paper Series, no. WPS 4981. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/4173%5Cnhttp://hdl.handle.net/10986/4173%5Cn.
Caskey, John P, Clemente Ruiz Duran, and Tova Maria Solo. 2006. “The Urban Unbanked in Mexico and the United States.” World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3835 February: 1–60.
Chakravarty, Satya R., and Rupayan Pal. 2013. “Financial Inclusion in India: An Axiomatic Approach.” Journal of Policy Modeling 35 (5): 813–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpolmod.2012.12.007.
Collard, Sharon, Elaine Kempson, and Claire Whyley. 2001. “Tackling Financial Exclusion: An Area-Based Approach.” The Policy Press June.
Committee, Rangrajan. 2008. “Report of the Committee on Financial Inclusion.”
Conroy, John. 2005. APEC AND FINANCIAL EXCLUSION: MISSED OPPORTUNITIES FOR COLLECTIVE ACTION?Asia-Pacific Development Journal. Vol. 12. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107415324.004.
CRISIL. 2015. “An Index to Measure India’s Progress on Financial Inclusion.” CRISIL III: 1–148. https://www.crisil.com/content/dam/crisil/our-analysis/publications/crisil-inclusix/CRISIL-Inclusix-An-index-to-measure-indias-progress-on-financial-inclusion-vol3-june2015.pdf.
CRISIL Inclusix. 2018. “CRISIL Inclusix: Financial Inclusion Surges, Driven by Jan-Dhan Yojana.” Journal of Human Development and Capabilities 4 (February): 1–88. https://doi.org/10.1080/14649880802675366.
Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, Leora Klapper, Dorothe Singer, and Peter Van Oudheusden. 2015. “The Global Findex Database 2014: Measuring Financial Inclusion around the World.” Policy Research Working Paper- 7255, no. April: 11.
DHAN. 2018. “The Dhan Academy DHAN Foundation.” 2018. https://www.dhan.org/themes/tata-dhan-academy.php.
Efobi, Uchenna, Ibukun Beecroft, and Evans Osabuohien. 2014. “Access to and Use of Bank Services in Nigeria: Micro-Econometric Evidence.” Review of Development Finance 4 (2): 104–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rdf.2014.05.002.
Ghosh, Saibal, and D. Vinod. 2017. “What Constrains Financial Inclusion for Women? Evidence from Indian Micro Data.” World Development. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2016.11.011.
Gupta, Sanjeev Kumar. 2011. “Financial Inclusion - IT as Enabler.” Reserve Bank of India Occasional Papers 32 (2): 129–48.
Gwalani, Hema, and Shilpa Parkhi. 2014. “Financial Inclusion – Building a Success Model in the Indian Context.” Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2014.04.203.
Kempson, E., and C Whyley. 1998. “Access to Current Accounts: A Report to the British Bankers’ Association.” British Bankers’ Association.
Kempson, Elaine, Adele Atkinson, and Odile Pilley. 2004. “Policy Level Response to Financial Exclusion in Developed Economies : Lessons for Developing Countries.” The Personal Finance Research Centre, University of Bristol, no. September.
Kempson, Elaine, and T Jones. 2000. “Banking Without Branches: A Study of How People and Small Businesses Conduct Their Banking Without a Local Branch: A Report to the British Bankers’ Association.” British Bankers’ Association.
Kempson, Elaine, and Claire Whyley. 1999. “Kept Out or Opted Out?: Understanding and Combating Financial Exclusion.” The Policy Press, 56. http://books.google.com/books?id=eLsdAAAACAAJ&pgis=1.
Leeladhar, Shri. 2006. “Taking Banking Services to the Common Man - Financial Inclusion.” Reserve Bank of India Bulletin 9519: 73–77.
Leyshon, Andrew, and Nigel Thrift. 2016. “Geographies of Financial Exclusion: Financial Abandonment in Britain and the United States.” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 20 (3): 312–41.
Mahendra Dev, S. 2006. “Financial Inclusion : Issues and Challenges.” Economic And Political Weekly 41 (41): 4310–13.
Menon, Nidhiya, and Yana van der Meulen. 2011. “How Access to Credit Affects Selfemployment: Differences by Gender during India’s Rural Banking Reform.” Journal of Development Studies 47 (1): 48–69. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220381003706486.
Mohan, Rakesh. 2006. “ECONOMIC GROWTH, FINANCIAL DEEPENING AND FINANCIAL INCLUSION.” In The Annual Bankers’ Conference 2006, at Hyderabad on Nov 3, 2006, 6–26.
Nair, Ajai. 2005. “Sustainability of Microfinance Self Help Groups in India : Would Federating Help ?” World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3516, no. February 2005.
Nair, Tara, and Ajay Tankha. 2015. Inclusive Finance India Report 2014. OXFORD University Press. www.oup.com.
Napier, A. David, Clyde Ancarno, Beverley Butler, Joseph Calabrese, Angel Chater, Helen Chatterjee, François Guesnet, et al. 2014. “Culture and Health.” The Lancet 384 (9954): 1607–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(14)61603-2.
Nayak, Ranjan Kumar. 2012. “Volume 4 Issue 3 Financial Inclusion through Cooperative October-December 2012 Banks: A Feasible Option for Inclusive Growth.” Indore Management Journal 4 (3): 9–17.
Ozili, Peterson K. 2020. “Financial Inclusion Research around the World: A Review.” Forum for Social Economics 0 (0): 1–23. https://doi.org/10.1080/07360932.2020.1715238.
Planning Commission. 2008. “Eleventh Five Year Plan (2007-2012) Inclusive Growth. New Delhi.”
Pokhriyal, A.K., and Vipin Ghildiyal. 2011. “Progress of Microfinance and Financial Inclusion ‘A Critical Analysis of SHG-Bank Linkage Program in India.’” International Journal of Economics and Finance 3 (2): 255–62. https://doi.org/10.5539/ijef.v3n2p255.
PRADAN. 2018. “Professional Assistance for Development Action (PRADAN).” New Delhi: Deep Publications. 2018. https://csrbox.org/India_organization_Delhi-Professional-Assistance-for-Development-Action-(PRADAN)_6700#:~:text=Founded in 1983%2C PRADAN has,rural pockets with the poor.
Ramakrishna, R. V. 2006. “MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM (MIS) SHG BANK LINKAGE PROGRAMME, NABARD.” GTZ, NABARD New Delhi, no. April: 1–9.
Rangrajan, C. 2005. “‘Agricultural Credit: Reaching the Marginalised Farmers.’” In Lecture Delivered at the Bankers’ Conference (BANCON), November. Kolkata.
Ray, Debraj. 1998. “Development Economics.” Princeton University Press., no. March: 1–32. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781785365065.00013.
RBI. 2006. “Financial Inclusion by Extension of Banking Services - Use of Business Facilitators and Correspondents.”
Reddy, Amarender, and Dharm Malik. 2011. “A Review of SHG-Bank Linkage Programme in India.” Indian Journal of Industrial Economics and Development 7 (2): 1–10.
Sarma, Mandira. 2008. “Index of Financial Inclusion.” Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations Working Paper No 215.
Sarma, Mandira, and Jesim Pais. 2008. “Financial Inclusion and Development: A Cross Country Analysis.” In Annual Conference of the Human Development and Capability Association, New Delhi 168 (10–13): 1–30. https://doi.org/10.1002/jid.
Smith, Adam. 1776. AN INQUIRY INTO THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF THE WEALTH OF NATIONS. Landon: The Electric Book Company Ltd.
Srinivasan, N. 2008. Sustainability of SHGs, Microfinance in India. Sage.
Swamy, Vighneswara. 2014. “Financial Inclusion, Gender Dimension, and Economic Impact on Poor Households.” World Development 56: 1–15.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2013.10.019.
Varghese, G., & Viswanathan, L. 2018."Normative perspectives on financial inclusion: Facts beyond statistics". Journal of Public Affairs, 18, 1–5.
World Bank. 2014. Global Financial Development Report 2014:Financial Inclusion. Global Financial Development Report 2014:Financial Inclusion. https://doi.org/10.1596/9780821399859.
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
Copyright (c) 2025 Neha Somani, Manisha Kumari, Avantika Singh
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Allows users to: distribute and copy the article; create extracts, abstracts, and other revised versions, adaptations or derivative works of or from an article (such as a translation); include in a collective work (such as an anthology); and text or data mine the article. These uses are permitted even for commercial purposes, provided the user: gives appropriate credit to the author(s) (with a link to the formal publication through the relevant URL ID); includes a link to the license; indicates if changes were made; and does not represent the author(s) as endorsing the adaptation of the article or modify the article in such a way as to damage the authors' honor or reputation. CC BY
