Contemporary Banking In India
Rekha Rane, MICA- Ahmedabad
Edited by: Naina Lal Kidwai
Contributers: Adil Zainul bhai, Aditya Puri, Arun Duggal, Bindu Ananth, C. Rangarajan, Chanda Kochhar, Duvvuri Subbarao, Gunit Chadha, Jaspal Bindra, K. C. Chakrabarty, KR. Kamath, M. D. Mallya, M. V. Nair, Neeraj Aggarwal, P. J. Nayak, Rana Kapoor, Subir Gokarn, Sunil Bharti Mittal, Viral V Acharya, Y. M. Deosthalee
House of Publication: ABP Group( Business World) Year of Publication: 2012 Edition: 1 Number of Pages: 320 Price: `595 ISBN: 978-93-81425-02-2
BOOK REVIEWS
Mr. C. Rangarajan( Chairman of the Prime Minister ' s Economic Advisory Council), one of the prime contributors to this book starts off by saying,“ In any economy, the financial sector plays a critical role in facilitating economic growth”. This is the basic premise on which this book has been edited and compiled by Ms. Naina Lal Kidwai, currently Group General Manager and Country Head HSBC India and former President of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry( FICCI). The belief that the Indian Banking Sector plays a crucial role in developing the socioeconomic conditions of the country has propelled the editor and the contributors to capture the developments and issues of the Banking Sector in India. The book written with banking practitioners, students, academicians and policy makers in mind, talks about the changes brought by the monetary policy in India, the progress made, and the scope still left for further development of the Banking Sector and the Economy. The intention of the book is to broaden debate amongst all involved by leveraging the expertise of the eminent practitioners and key thought leaders. It brings to forefront many imminent issues in the Banking Sector and the challenges facing the re-emergence of the economic euphoria that India witnessed in the mid- 2000s.
India ' s economic growth story has been the talk of many economic forums in the past decade, fuelled mainly by the resilience shown by the country during the global financial crisis in 2008. The crisis that occurred then, and is again evident presently in the developed world is attributed majorly to regulation failures in the banking systems of the respective countries. One of the main themes that are glaringly obvious in the book is the role that regulation can, and has played, in stabilising, maintaining and propelling the Indian economy. The banks in India have, until recently, remained relatively isolated from upheavals in global economies due to the stringent rules put forth by the very prudent and effective regulator, Reserve Bank of India. The high levels of core equity required to be present in the capital base along with the feature of the rupee only being partially convertible has been the reason for the Banking Sector and India ' s economy to stay relatively unaffected by outside developments till now. N. L. Kidwai ' s underlying logic for editing this book, however, is not the famed growth story. According to her, India ' s unmatched potential for growth cannot be realised in the current scenario because the Banking Sector is now unable to match the growth in other sectors in the Indian industry, raising serious concerns about its capacity to invest in capital formation and enhancement. What N. L. Kidwai tries to put forth through this book is the direct opportunity for the Banking Sector in providing the much needed growth for the Indian industry and economy by placing equal responsibility for the same on the monetary policy makers, and the banks.
The book itself is divided in four sections that logically
103