A STUDY ON FINANCIAL INCLUSION AWARENESS AMONG SELECTED WORKING WOMEN OF SATNA (M.P.)

Transcription

1 A STUDY ON FINANCIAL INCLUSION AWARENESS AMONG SELECTED WORKING WOMEN OF SATNA (M.P.) SHWETA SINGH Research scholar at MGCGV Chitrakoot, Satna (M.P.) ABSTRACT This research work is based on the awareness of working women towards financial inclusion in Satna. As we know that financial inclusion plays very important role in the growth of Indian Economy. Financial inclusion means including the people and working women who are excluded from finance. This is very helpful for the people who are not aware about the financial product and services provided by the bank. The main purpose of financial inclusion is that including the people who are not having higher income. RBI had suggested to open No Frills account or minimum balance accounts who with the help of financial inclusion. The paper focused on working women because they are not aware about all the facilities provided by the banks. To analyse the extent of saving and credit facilities of working women from different educational institutions, to find out the reason behind not using and availing the financial products and services, further to suggest how to get involved in this. Primary data has been collected through questionnaire and respondents were selected from different institutions. This study will help working women to reduce the dissatisfaction level towards financial inclusion and will enhance their financial awareness which will be helpful for women empowerment too. Key words: Financial Inclusion, Financial Product, No Frills Account, working women, women empowerment, Financial awareness. I. INTRODUCTION OF FINANCIAL INCLUSION Financial inclusion or inclusive financing is the delivery of financial services at affordable costs to sections of disadvantaged and low-income segments of society, in contrast to financial exclusion where those services are not available or affordable. Financial Inclusion is delivery of financial services like Bank Accounts, Savings Products, Remittances & Payment services, Insurance, Financial advisory services, Entrepreneurial credit, Micro finance and Micro Credit to the weaker section in rural and urban areas, also not to ignore unemployed, Women, Old people, Physically challenged people etc at an affordable cost. 122 P a g e

2 II. HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE OF FINANCIAL INCLUSION IN INDIA: 1954 : All-India Rural Credit Survey Committee report -suggested Multi-agency approach for financing the rural and agricultural sector; 1963 : Formation of Agricultural Refinance Corporation 1969: Nationalization of 14 major Private Banks The flow of agricultural and rural credit witnessed a rapid increase 1972 Mandatory system of Priority Sector Lending (PSL) 1975 : Establishment of RRBs 1980 : Nationalization of 6 more private banks 1982 : Establishment of NABARD through the transfer of RBI s agricultural credit department Provision of bank credit under Govt. Sponsored Subsidy Schemes Linking Agricultural Credit Targets at 18% with individual bank s net bank credit 1990 Implementation of the concept of Village level credit planning for 15 to 20 villages allotted to each of rural, semi-urban and urban branches of PSBs and RRBs under Service Area Approach Formulation of potential linked credit plan for each district annually by NABARD Agricultural Debt Relief Scheme and Financial Sector Reforms SHG-Bank Linkage as the most suitable model in Indian context a/c to NABARD 2000-Reforms sharply focused on Agricultural credit doubling the flow of agricultural credit implementation of agricultural credit package Annual Special Agricultural Credit Plan III. IMPORTANCE /NEED OF FINANCIAL INCLUSION IN INDIA From the above definition we came to know that financial inclusion is a tool to include those people who are financially excluded. This tool is used for the people who are not aware about the financial products and services which are provided by the banks and different financial institutions. This is helpful for those people 123 P a g e

3 who don t have high income and apart from that it includes rural people like farmers, workers and all people who are lying in the teenage to senior citizens. On the basis of above definition we need to know that why financial inclusion is necessary and what is its importance? To find out the answer we should know the importance of financial inclusion. Financial inclusion is important because- It helps the people to extend the habit to save money. It helps to make daily transactions like sending and receiving of money. It provides safety measures for saving to manage the cash flows and to generate the working capital for the smooth functioning of the businesses. It is helpful for the low income people to set their small businesses. It helps the owners of businesses and other people to invest their money in the suitable assets and grow their businesses. It helps to plan and pay for recurring expenses like school fees, day to day expenses of the business etc. It is helpful for the overall development of the rural and financially excluded people. The benefits of financial inclusion are not only significant for individuals but for economies as well. Financial inclusion is linked to a country s economic and social development, and plays a role in reducing extreme poverty. IV. STEPS TAKEN BY RBI TO SUPPORT FINANCIAL INCLUSION RBI set up Khan Commission in2004 to look into financial inclusion and the recommendations of the commission were incorporated into the midterm review of the policy ( ) and urged banks to review their existing practices to align them with the objective of financial inclusion. RBI also exhorted the banks and stressed the need to make available a basic banking no frills account either with nil or very minimum balances as well as charges that would make such accounts accessible to vast sections of the population of the many schemes and programmes pushed forward by RBI the following need: i) Initiation of no frills accounts ii) Banking services reaches homes through business correspondents iii) Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT). V. WHY FINANCIAL INCLUSION NEEDED IN INDIA ( A GRAPHICAL REPRESENTATION) 124 P a g e

4 VI. REVIEW OF LITERATURE Joseph Massey (2010) said that, role of financial institutions in a developing country is vital in promoting financial inclusion. The efforts of the government to promote financial inclusion and deepening can be further enhanced by the pro-activeness on the part of capital market players including financial institutions. Financial institutions have a very crucial and wider role to play in fostering financial inclusion. National and international forum have recognized this and efforts are seen on domestic and global levels to encourage the financial institutions to take up larger responsibilities in including the financially excluded lot.oya Pinar Ardic et al (2011) explained that using the financial access database by CGAP and the World Bank group, this paper counts the number of unbanked adults around the world, analyses the state of access to deposit and loan services as well as the extent of retail networks, and discusses the state of financial inclusion mandates around the world. The findings indicate that there is yet much to be done in the financial inclusion arena. Fiftysix percent of adults in the world do not have access to formal financial services. According to Dr. K.C. Chakrabarty, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India, said that financial Inclusion is the process of ensuring access to appropriate financial products and services needed by all sections of the society in general and vulnerable groups such as weaker sections and low income groups in particular at an affordable cost in a fair and transparent manner by mainstream institutional players. Dr. Anupama Sharma, & Ms. Sumita Kukreja has concluded in their study that Financial Inclusion has not yielded the desired results and there is long road ahead but no doubt it is playing a significant role and is working on the positive side. T. Ravikumar has concluded in his study that if government is advocating any kind of sustained development and stability whether financial, economic, political or social and inclusive growth with stability, it is not possible to attain these goals without achieving financial inclusion. Thus, financial inclusion is no longer a policy choice today but a policy compulsion. And, banking is a key driver for financial inclusion/inclusive growth. VII. OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY i) To analyze the extent at which working women access to saving facility and credit facility. ii) To identify the reason for not saving and availing financial services provided by the banks. iii) To suggest the working women to access the financial products and services of the banks. VIII. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY This research paper is based on descriptive research. In this research primary data has been used. For collection of data a structured questionnaire has been prepared which contained 20 questions related to financial produts and services provided by the banks. For filling the questionnaire 50 respondents were selected through simple random sampling method from few educational institutions. This study is based on the awareness of the working women therefore all the respondents are female teachers. Although 50 respondents were selected but due to some of the reasons expected respondents were not able to fill up the questionnaire. Factor analysis has been done on the basis of measures of central tendency (average). 125 P a g e

5 IX. FINDINGS On the basis of questionnaire 5 factors have been considered for the analysis, factors are denoted with F1,F2 and so on these factors are shown with the help of following table:- S. No Factors Mean value 1 F1(analysis of basic awareness of working women) F2 (level of satisfaction in the financial inclusion) F3 ( statistics of saving schemes in households) F4 (comparative analysis of institutional & non institutional finance) F5 ( in depth analysis of customers in financial inclination) Interpretation of above factors The interpretations of the above factors are as follows:- 1) F3 (statistics of saving schemes in households and its mean value is 27.4):-It has got the highest mean value which indicates that this study is related to financial inclusion received more open answers related to the statistics of saving schemes in the households. To say that working women in educational institution in Satna region are more aware. They are aware about the account which they have, types of financial services which they are using and apart from that this value indicates that they all are using the financial products like debit card, credit card, current a/c, savings a/c, and recurring a/c etc. 2) F5 (In depth analysis of customers in financial inclination and its mean value is 8.3):- This factor has got the second highest mean value which indicates that why working women are using the financial products? After collecting the data with the help of questionnaire it has been found that all the financial products which are providing by the banks are reliable, easy to use, and affordable. Apart from that it is found that are the working women aware to open bank accounts or they have helped by others to have an account. And if they have ever took the loan from the bank then which type of difficulties they have faced during the process. 3) F1( analysis of basic awareness of working women and its mean value is 7.3):- This factor has got third highest value which indicates that the working women are aware about holding a bank a/c, loan facility, financial products and services and procedures of sanctioning the loan. And they are frequently using these services. 4) F4 (comparative analysis of institutional and non institutional finance and its mean value is 4.8):- This factor has got comparatively lowest mean value as compared to others which indicates that in present scenario working women as well as other people are very much focused on institutional finance because this is more systematic and informative source of finance. Banks and other financial institutions are the example of institutional finance. 5) F2 (level of satisfaction in financial services and its mean value is 3.1):- This factor has the lowest value which indicates that customers are not satisfied with the services provided by the banks. The dissatisfaction level of customers indicates that either they want some changes in facilities provided by the banks or they are not able to understand services properly. 126 P a g e

6 X. CONCLUSION After analyzing all the factors collected through questionnaire, it was found that the factor 4(F4) has the second lowest value as compared to others this factor indicates that comparison between institutional and non institutional finance. As Satna itself a sub urban area therefore till day more people are using non institutional finance (e.g. sahukaar, chit funds, money lenders etc.). By the means of face to face interaction from working women I came to know that at present also working women are incline towards non institutional finance because this is time saving process because in this process sahukaars and money lenders focus on face to face interaction with customers. To avoid the lengthy process and administration of institutional finance working women prefer to use non institutional finance because they don t have time to be in queue for filling the forms and relevant documents due to their busy schedules of work. Because of this factor the dissatisfaction level of working women increased and has the least mean value (3.1) as compared to others. This value indicates the level of dissatisfaction towards financial services and products by the banks. Although working women are using banking facilities, still they are not having proper knowledge about other online facilities like online payment of bills, fund transfers, social security schemes, online opening of bank accounts, and auto renewal of deposit etc. Therefore we can say that the insufficient knowledge about these facilities creates dissatisfaction among working women. But after go through the previous researches in this field it was analyzed that dissatisfaction can be reduced through the financial inclusion awareness camps and seminars in their educational institutions. With the help of these programmes they would be able to know the relevancy of these facilities at their workplace. This awareness will be helpful for the working women because they can easily access all the facilities from their workplace and need not to rush to the banks.it will also encourage the women to move a step forward towards women empowerment, which is a national and global issue. XI. BIBLIOGRAPHY Books Banking and Insurance by Priyka khanna, Jagroop Singh- Kalyani Publishers. Retreived From: [1] Asli Demirguc - Kunt and Klapper, L. (2012): Measuring Financial Inclusion, Policy Research Working Paper, 6025, World Bank,April [2] Anderloni, L., Carluccio, E.M., (2007), Access to Bank Accounts and Payment Services, in: Anderloni, L., Braga, M.D. and E.M. Carluccio (eds.), New Frontiers in Banking Services, Berlin et al.: Springer, [3] Basu, priya and srivastava, 2005 Exploring Possibilities: Microfinance and Rural Credit Access for the poor in India, Economic and Political Weekly, 40(17): P a g e

7 [4] Beck, T., A. Demirguc-Kunt, M. Soledad and M. Peria (2007), Reaching Out: Access to and Use of Banking Services across Countries, Journal of Financial Economics, Vol. 85, No. 1, pp Census of India 1991 and [5] Chakrabarty, K.C., (2011), Financial Inclusion and Banks: Issues and Perspectives Address delivered at the FICCI UNDP Seminar on Financial Inclusion: Partnership between Banks, MFIs and Communities at New Delhi on October [6] Handbook of statistics on Indian economy [7]. Kiatchai Sophastienphong and Anoma Kulathunga, (2009) Getting Finance in South Asia, (2009): Indicators and Analysis of the Commercial Banking Sector World Bank, Washington DC. [8] Peachy, S. / Roe, A. (2006): Access to finance what does it mean and how do savings banks foster access, A Study for the World Savings Banks Institute, Perspectives No. 49, Oxford Policy Management. [9].Report on Currency and Finance , Reserve Bank of India. 128 P a g e