With the novel objective of making Tamil Nadu the first ‘hut free State’ in the country by 2016, the state government launched a rural housing scheme called “Kalaignar Veedu Vazhangum Thittam” (KVVT) for rural areas with the objective of replacing all thatched houses in villages with robust all-weather houses over a 6-year period.

Infrastructure facilities such as clearing houses, depositories, stock exchanges, and commodity exchanges are the backbone of any financial system.

The AP microfinance crisis has raised significant questions on the design of the financial system that best ensures inclusion. The crisis has revealed deep discomfort with the regulation of Non-Deposit taking Institutions (NDI). Some observers have equated NDIs to moneylenders.

For a business operation, a great deal of what happens on the field is determined by how equipped its field managers are.

In this paper, we present two stylized models of the financial system. We make the case that in order to realize the potential of a well-functioning complete financial market, financial system designers and financial service providers will need to think about ways to deliver financial propositions that are customized to individual households by responding to their unique circumstances.

Markets typically exist within the boundaries set by the state. The financial markets are no exception to this. Mobilisation and allocation of capital - the key roles of the financial system – are done within the framework defined by the government.

What does it mean to be a farmer in Kurnool (a district in Andhra Pradesh)? One part of the district grows commercial crops such as sunflower and tobacco while another supports nothing but paddy (the Telugu-Ganga Canal influences the soil in way that only paddy can be grown here).

Over the last few years, microfinance has attracted a large number of equity and debt investors.

Fitch Ratings has recently issued a report on Indian microfinance securitisations, which has drawn a conclusion that the rating of securitisation transactions must be linked to the rating of the servicer with a suggested cap of 7 notches on the difference between the highest rated tranche and the rating of the servicer.

Though India has deep financial infrastructure comprising a large number of bank and post-office branches; agricultural cooperative societies; and, now, micro finance institutions; there still remain gaps that have prevented us from leveraging the full potential of this financial infrastructure.