RBI does not give away money, Rajan warns against fraud

Will use social media to address fraud, he says

The governor of Reserve Bank of India, Raghuram Rajan today warned against fraud e-mails that come in his name. The e-mails ask for bank account information saying that RBI would wire huge amounts of money.

“Let me assure you that RBI does not give away money,” said Rajan, in his speech at IT industry event NASSCOM. “It just follows the adage that if something looks too good to be true, it probably is,” he said.

Taking on the theme of Nasscom which focused on social media and marketing, Rajan also said that the regulator can use social media to address some frauds and see how they can disseminate information on it.

“It is still in early stages. There are no plans for it. The people here at Nasscom can help us with it,” said Raja. He also said that a lot of filtering has to take place and could use the social medium over time.

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Information technology can also help in easing out Know Your Customer norms for banks, especially when it comes to financial inclusion. In the current state, KYC norms which are being stringently followed by banks, keep many away from the banking system.

“There can be IT-enabled analysis of savings patterns (for the unbanked) which can be used to check the credit allocation for them. This can help banks analyse who can use credit,” said Rajan. Banking to the unbanked was until now being driven by credit, it should also be encouraged from the savings side, just like how many self help groups are doing, he opined.