From Ledgers to APIs - Exploring 30 Years of Indian Credit | Forging Ahead In India

Why It Matters

Understanding these shifts helps banks and fintechs design products that capture underserved credit demand while managing risk, shaping the future profitability of India’s rapidly digitising lending landscape.

Key Takeaways

• Indian credit shifted from corporate dominance to mass retail lending.
• Technology and bureaus enabled sub‑₹50k loans with rapid approvals.
• UPI has eroded traditional credit‑card payment and revolving models.
• Banks need balanced secured and unsecured portfolios to sustain margins.
• Real‑time bureau data and alternate sources are critical for new‑to‑credit.

Summary

The conversation with Rajesh Kumar, former head of retail credit risk at HTFC and senior executive at CIBIL, traced three decades of transformation in India’s credit ecosystem. Starting from a corporate‑centric balance sheet in the 1990s, the market gradually embraced housing, auto, two‑wheel, and credit‑card products as the salaried middle class expanded and regulatory reforms opened the economy.

Kumar highlighted how technology, digitisation, and the maturation of credit bureaus reshaped underwriting. Faster data pipelines and API‑driven scoring now allow sub‑₹50,000 loans to be approved in minutes, while the rise of UPI has disrupted the payment side of credit cards, driving revolver ratios down from 40‑45% to roughly 15‑20%. He warned that banks remain overly comfortable with secured, salaried borrowers and must diversify into unsecured and gig‑economy segments to maintain healthy net interest margins.

Memorable remarks included, “A credit card is a wondrous little plastic… but UPI has completely disrupted it,” and “Real‑time bureau data will be the next frontier for risk assessment.” Kumar also praised regulators for improving bureau coverage, standardisation, and timeliness, while calling for real‑time feeds and alternate data to serve the still‑large new‑to‑credit population.

The implications are clear: lenders must balance secured and unsecured books, leverage API‑enabled credit‑bureau integrations, and adopt alternate data sources to capture underserved borrowers. Fintechs and traditional banks alike will compete on speed, cost‑to‑acquire, and risk‑adjusted pricing, making the next few years pivotal for India’s credit market evolution.

Original Description

India's retail credit book has grown 2-3x GDP every five years. For three decades straight. And while India's credit industry says it wants to serve the underbanked, there is still a lot of unmet potential.

Rajesh Kumar, an Operating Advisory at BVP, is a 25-year veteran of India's banking and credit infrastructure, having built HDFC Bank's retail lending business into a $5.5B portfolio while leading teams of 16,000+ professionals. He then served as MD & CEO of TransUnion CIBIL, India's largest credit bureau, giving him a rare vantage point across both lending and credit data.

The real whitespace is not in lending more to the same salaried, high-bureau-score customers in the same six cities. It is in the segments the industry seems to keeps avoiding.

New-to-credit originations have dropped from 40% to barely 15-20% at an industry level. The gig economy is massive and largely unserved. Semi-urban and rural credit is just starting to move.

98-99% of retail borrowers eventually repay. So why does the industry treat new-to-credit customers like they are the risky 1-2%?

The infrastructure is ready, with UPI, Account Aggregator, and mature bureau systems. So who will build for the segments that the incumbents keep skipping?

In this conversation with Anurag Begwani and Vatsalya Tandon, Rajesh breaks down:

* Why the industry's risk aversion to NTC customers is not backed by the data

* How Autocure alone recovered thousands of crores without a single phone call

* Where founders building in lending should focus (and what mistakes to avoid)

* What is overhyped, underhyped, and dead on in Indian credit right now

Watch on .

Episode Flow:

0:00 – Introduction & Rajesh's journey into financial services

2:10 – Evolution of India's credit economy (1990s to Today)

6:05 – Credit cards, UPI disruption & secured cards

14:50 – Unsecured personal loans, NTC lending & bureau data

27:30 – Collections: Science, art & AI opportunities

40:20 – Regulatory landscape & its evolution

43:30 – Advice for fintech founders + rapid fire round