Indian banker urges to simplify banking

Kathmandu, Mar. 9

Anil Khandelwal, former Chairman and Managing Director of Bank of Baroda in India, suggested to make the banking system simpler to the common people in the society.

"There is more focus on technical system but we must not forget that banking is a socio-technical entity," he said while speaking at 'Digital leadership in banking' organised by Kathmandu Fintek and TAB Global in Lalitpur on Sunday.

The leadership guru also stressed that learning should be the new diet of new managers in the rapidly changing world economy. "But what we see is learning is being delegated to subordinates; this should not happen," he said.

Khandelwal stated that there is plenty of data but one should know what to do with it, else it’s useless to have it.

According to him, one needs to have a fondness to become a leader. Leadership cannot be a business of any organisation unless anyone shows interest and potential for it.

"Increase your expertise in listening and digesting information that you receive, reduce your aggressiveness and impatience," he said.

Likewise, Emmanuel Daniel, Founder of The Asian Banker (TAB Global), said that the future of the banking industry will be characterised by financial inclusion, digital platforms and personalisation and digital assets or token banking

Plugging in the ordinary citizens to the global economy is the demand of the day, so you should be doing this in Nepal as well, he told the Nepali bankers.

"Banking is a business that continuously needs to be relevant to the community and technology is leveraged to attain this goal," he said.

According to him, Nepal has bank assets of about 80 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) against 90 per cent that of India, about 200 per cent of China and 60 per cent of Bangladesh.

Likewise, only 45 per cent of Nepal's 30 million people have access to financial services against 74 per cent of India, 97 per cent of China and 74 per cent of Bangladesh.

Bangladesh is also a Least Developed Country (LDC) that is graduating to a 'Developing Nation' status along with Nepal and Laos in 2026.

Daniel said that Nepali banks are still labour intensive and there is an immediate need for a robust digitalisation of the entire industry and its services.

He suggested integrating remittances and payments into assets and work with fintechs on digital assets.

 Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 10 March 2025.