RBI Governor Stresses Balanced Regulations for Financial Inclusion & Digital Growth

By siliconindia  |  Wednesday, 26 March 2025, 11:19:09 AM IST

RBI Governor Stresses Balanced Regulations for Financial Inclusion & Digital Growth
Rules should not impose unintentional barriers to financial inclusion. Keeping due diligence in mind while ensuring customer rights and convenience, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Sanjay Malhotra said on Wednesday.
"India has progressed significantly and extraordinarily. According to our data, over 94 per cent of the adult population has a bank account, some of them more than one. But there remains a necessity to keep on widening and deepening it", he stated at the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) Private Sector Collaborative Forum.
He further indicated that even as it is essential to keep financial systems safe and secure against terrorist financing and money laundering, policymakers should make sure that what they do should not be excessively zealous and prohibitive on investments.
Besides, Malhotra mentioned that India has seen major progress in leveraging digitalisation in customer onboarding and due diligence procedures.
The Digital Know Your Customer (KYC) and Video KYC are beacons of this. The Central KYC Records Registry with over 1 billion records is one such example that has the ability to bring in a new era of customer onboarding with ease and seamless manner not only for customers but also for regulated entities", he stated.
But he warned that the system must be stronger, more effective and efficient so that all regulated entities can co-ordinate and streamline the KYC process. This would avoid unwarranted duplication of KYC checks by different entities for the same person.
At the same time, Malhotra reaffirmed that India would keep working on ensuring that its commitment to implementing the next phase of the G20 roadmap on inclusive cross-border payments is done by 2027.
It is only a question of time, I believe, that cross-border payments will also be very easy and cheaper," he stated.
Developing nations such as India have made tremendous strides in making digital payment more accessible, affordable and convenient. While card networks have assisted developing economies to advance quicker payment systems, platforms such as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in India have facilitated developing economies and emerging markets to jumpfrog in this space," he added.

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