The State Bank of India's Economic Research Department (ERD) is championing a transformative move by recommending a 33% reservation for women business correspondents (BC) to alter India's socio-economic landscape significantly.
The ERD team contends that this strategic initiative can bring in much-needed transparency, with women BC agents being characterized by enhanced patience and a greater willingness to address queries and explain product features.
Highlighting the potential advantages of women BC networks, the ERD report underscores their suitability for serving remote areas, elderly customers, and other under-served demographics. The unique attributes of women BC agents, such as patience and customer-centric approaches, are believed to foster more accessible and customer-friendly financial services.
Soumya Kanti Ghosh, Group Chief Economic Adviser at SBI, emphasizes the transformative potential of women BCs in promoting financial inclusion and empowering women at the grassroots level.
The recommended move aligns with activities typically undertaken by BCs, including disbursing small-value credit, recovering principal and collecting interest, managing small-value deposits, and selling various financial products.
This initiative aims to tap into the unique strengths of women agents, fostering a mix of advantages such as encouraging savings among women, onboarding first-time female users, facilitating low-value but high-frequency transactions, and providing doorstep delivery of financial services.
Over the past six years, the ERD points to the success of the Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana (PMMY) scheme, showcasing a notable increase in disbursement and deposits per woman. The PMMY scheme, designed to empower women at the grassroots level, has seen disbursement per woman rise to Rs 49,157 and deposits per woman increase to Rs 42,500.
As the ERD pushes for greater representation of women in the financial domain, this initiative not only aligns with the broader goal of financial inclusion but also stands as a testament to the pivotal role women can play in reshaping the landscape of banking and economic development.
The move is poised to empower women, enhance financial services accessibility, and contribute to the larger narrative of gender equality and socio-economic progress in India.
