Profits vs duty

Your Editorial rightly draws attention to the widening fault line between banking profitability and public responsibility. ICICI Bank’s recent decision to sharply increase the minimum average balance (MAB) may have been permissible under RBI norms, yet it stood in sharp contrast to India’s decade-long drive for financial inclusion.

The timing was particularly tone-deaf. Inflation continues to gnaw at household budgets, and wage growth remains flat.

For many first-time account holders, a savings account is not a luxury but a gateway to the formal economy.

Public backlash was swift. Social media outrage and public figures like Jay Kotak amplified criticism, forcing the bank to roll back the requirement to ₹15,000 for metros and ₹2,500 for rural areas.

This reversal is a reminder that in banking, policy decisions must weigh the broader social impact alongside commercial imperatives.

Vijay Singh Adhikari

Nainital (Uttarakhand)

Inclusive banking

Money managers are unanimous that with GDP growth distribution of wealth will be increasingly skewed, to further marginalise the lesser privileged.

In 2022-23, the top 1 per cent of Indians earned 22.6 per cent of all national income and controlled 40.1 per cent of national wealth, when the middle class is maintaining consumption through debt, with stagnant wages.

This brings us to the highly disproportionate onus carried by public sector banks in inclusive schemes as the PMJDY. While PSBs cover 79 per cent of the total accounts the private banks, a mere 3 per cent.

This, when the total market cap of private banks is double that of the public sector banks.

Private banks need to imbibe an ethos of socio-economic inclusiveness even as they seek to serve the affluent.

R Narayanan

Navi Mumbai

Expediting resolution

With reference to the article NCLT 2.0 — now backed by Parliament’, after a decade of its launch, NCLT 2.0 aims to improve NCLT by managing backlogs and streamlining processes.

Listing of these cases is the biggest pain point. Ideally these cases listing should be based on urgency and stage of the case.

Needless to say that all eggs should not be kept in one basket and there has to be segmentation of cases based on the value of the transaction.

With roughly 13 per cent cases being decided in six months and others taking longer, it defies the whole purpose of NCLT.

NCLT 2.0 should address all these issues so that we are able to regain investors’ trust.

Bal Govind

Noida

Published on August 14, 2025