Hidden Risks in Retail Lending

Q1. Could you start by giving us a brief overview of your professional background, particularly focusing on your expertise in the industry?

I am a banking practitioner and a certified credit & risk specialist with over 18 years of experience in the Indian financial sector. Most of my career has been spent "on the desk," managing the complexities of Corporate Credit and Credit Risk Management during some of the most transformative years for the Indian banking Industry.

My core expertise lies in Credit & Credit Risk, a domain I have lived and breathed for nearly two decades. At State Bank of India (SBI), I served as Vice President (Corporate Credit), where I was responsible for the end-to-end credit life cycle of high-value corporate loans—from appraisal and loan structuring/rating to sanction and, subsequently, the ongoing monitoring of large corporate portfolios. This experience gave me a ground-level view of how industrial cycles and economic shifts impact creditworthiness in our country.

Later, as the Head of Credit Risk at Bandhan Bank since its inception as Universal Bank, I was tasked with building and overseeing the entire credit risk frameworks across all loan segments during the institution’s critical transition into a universal bank and…