Mumbai, NFAPost: The Reserve Bank of India cautioned people against unauthorised digital lending apps amid growing concerns over coercive recovery tactics and exorbitant interest rates charged by a section of such lenders.
“There have been reports about individuals and small businesses falling prey to the growing number of unauthorised digital lending platforms and mobile apps on promises of getting loans in a quick and hassle-free manner,” the RBI said.
The apex bak’s caution comes at a time when India is going ahead with its Digital India initiatives where banking and financial sector is going for an overhaul supported by digital technologies.
It cautioned the public not to fall prey to such unscrupulous activities and verify the antecedents of the company offering loans online or through mobile apps.
Moreover, consumers should never share copies of know your customer (KYC) documents with unidentified persons, unverified and unauthorised apps and should report such apps and bank account information associated with the apps to concerned law enforcement agencies or use sachet portal (https://sachet.rbi.org.in) to file an on-line complaint,” the central bank said.
Reserve Bank has also mandated that digital lending platforms which are used on behalf of Banks and NBFCs should disclose name of the Bank(s) or NBFC(s) upfront to the customers.
Recently, RBI appointed co-founder of Infosys Ltd Kris Gopalakrishnan to chair the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) new innovation hub, which aims to promote advancement in the financial sector using technology.
“The RBIH shall create an ecosystem that would focus on promoting access to financial services and products. This will also promote financial inclusion. The hub will collaborate with financial sector institutions, technology industry and academic institutions and coordinate efforts for exchange of ideas and development of prototypes related to financial innovations,” RBI said.
The government initiative to unveil India Stack, an ambitious project of creating a unified software platform to bring India’s population into the digital age. India Stack is a set of APIs that allows governments, businesses, startups and developers to utilise a unique digital Infrastructure to solve India’s hard problems towards presence-less, paperless, and cashless service delivery.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella recently praised the ‘Digital India’ campaign that is being aggressively promoted since 2015 and said it has transformed the prospects and the opportunity in India’s tech industry. He highlighted the fact the ‘Digital India’ framework had made India stand out and said the India stack is pretty impressive.
