India to set up ‘women’s bank’

INR10 billion set aside to capitalise new bank that is to focus on lending to women, be managed and staffed by them.

NEW DELHI: India’s government said Thursday it would set up a new public sector bank for women as part of efforts to address gender imbalances in a country still reeling from protests over a fatal gang-rape in New Delhi.

Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said INR10 billion had been set aside to capitalise the new bank that is to focus on lending to women and be managed and staffed by them.

"I hope to obtain the necessary approvals and banking licence by October 2013 and invite all honourable members to the inauguration of the bank shortly thereafter," he told parliament as he presented the 2013/14 budget.

Last week, the Reserve Bank of India paved the way for the issuance of new bank licences in a push to expand financial services across the country where fewer than half of the country's 1.2 billion people have a bank account.

Other examples of women-only banks exist in neighbouring Pakistan, which opened one in 1989, and in Tanzania in East Africa where a similar version became operational in 2009.

Separately, Chidambaram also announced the creation of a 10-billion-rupee fund aimed at improving the safety of women amid criticism of the government for failing to do more to tackle sex crime.

In December, a 23-year-old physiotherapy student was raped and murdered on a New Delhi bus in a vicious attack that provoked street protests and a bout of deep introspection about India's attitude to women.

"Recent incidents have cast a long, dark shadow on our liberal and progressive credentials," Chidambaram said.

"We stand in solidarity with our girl children and women. And we pledge to do everything possible to empower them and to keep them safe and secure," he said to cheers from members of parliament.