Post Liberalisation Scenario of Indian Banking and Regulations from Customer Services Perspective: A Critical Review
Abstract
In 1991-1992 Liberalisation has been initiated in Indian economy, and liberalisation is incomplete without Globalisation and Privatisation (LPG). All these initiatives have opened the doors for the private and foreign parties,who were interested in banking business. LPG has fastened the pace of growth in Indian Economy, mobilizing the funds, immense infrastructure development, investment churning etc. From the customer perspective, services have been improved drastically, transaction time has been reduced, customers are empowered by technology driven banking. Earlier customers had to choose Public sector banks as an only option, to avail the banking services but after LPG there are many options to get banking services. Although private sector banks has given a intense competition to the PSU banks but they joined the banking industry with a motive of profitability and wealth maximisation, a large number of complex products are introduced to meet the different requirements of the customer, but these products are not easily understood by the customers and leads to misselllling. In the name of the superior services, multiple and exorbitant charges are levied on the customers and erode the customer money. By arranging the modern looking facilities and maintaining physical appearance of the branch premises, higher Average balance is demandedfrom the customers. The services are provided on the basis of the financial health of the customer. In this paper we briefly elaborate the post liberalization scenario and the bank practices with the provisions of the Banking code and standard board of India (Autonomous body established by Reserve Bank of India to take care of the customer interest by monitoring the customer services practices in banks). In this research we found that banks are lacking in providing services as per the commitments made by BCSBI code and certain issues are raised by the customers regarding insufficiency in the services.
