Srei's great leap back underlines high-risk nature of NBFC business

In the past three decades, the Kanorias have weathered many a crisis, including the NBFC crisis of the 1990s and the global financial crisis in 2008-09

Srei promoter Hemant Kanoria sees similarities bet­ween his predicament and the apocryphal story of King Porus after he lost the fam­ous Battle of Hydaspes to Alex­ander the Great. Asked how he wished to be treated, Porus ap­parently replied, “Treat me as a king would treat another king.”

“We didn’t even say that. But we are also a lender with borrowers and in the same position,” Kanoria said.

The reference is in the context of banks approaching the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for a resolution that resembles that of the fraud-hit Dewan Housing Finance Ltd, which was recently acquired by