Indians pile up debt in old age: Report

Sharing of data raises privacy concerns; there should be rights-based privacy framework: FSDC report

The average Indian household holds 84 per cent of its wealth in real estate and other physical goods, 11 per cent in gold and the residual five per cent in financial assets, and as households age, they pile up debt, a peculiarity unique to Indians, a report of the household finance committee hasfound. 

More than half the debt Indian households accumulate, even at the top of the wealth distribution, are unsecured, reflecting an “unusually high reliance on non-institutional sources such moneylenders”.

In comparison, “households in advanced economies hold substantially more financial assets than their Indian counterparts, are much more likely to finance