Letters: Queue for bank licence

With reference to "Transforming bank licensing" (August 8), the editorial was timely and self-explanatory. Continuity is an issue by all means. But it is unlikely that there will be a relatively long queue in front of the tap for bank licence. An individual with a minimum of 10 years' banking experience and solid cash of Rs 255 crore in pocket will be rare. For those who have done banking in India, it will be beyond imagination, much less an impossibility. So, the opportunities for individuals will be limited to the few who are enriched with banking experience abroad.

The instructions do not permit public sector units to float a bank. Had it been permitted, non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) fully owned by various state governments would have been able to contemplate entering the universal banking, at least for the niche market of their respective states. The tap is not open for them. This will further shorten the queue. It will end up in NBFCs officially calling themselves as "banks" and continuing the job which they were doing hitherto.

P D Sankaranarayanan Thiruvananthapuram

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