With banks blindsided by Covid-19, incidence of fraud may well have gone up

RBI's supervisory load has also gone up, with both non-banking financial companies and urban co-operative banks coming under closer scrutiny

Mark Twain once said that “a banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants it back the minute it begins to rain”. A lot has changed since the humourist’s days — it is bankers who are now out in the rain, and none will be singing anytime soon. And if the spectre of a huge spike in dud-loans was not bad enough, the incidence of fraud could also headed northwards, fuelled by the pandemic.
 
Consider the following setting. Over the past 14 months, there was no way bankers could have ensured