When technology hurts the poor: Rethinking digital technologies in Microfinance in India
By Prof. Nidhi S. Bisht and Prof. Arun Kumar Tripathy, Management Development Institute Gurgaon
Digital technologies are often celebrated as powerful tools for financial inclusion. From mobile banking to digital loan disbursement, technology promises to bring millions of underserved people, especially poor women in rural India, into the formal financial system. But this promise is only part of the story.
A recent study on microfinance institutions (MFIs) in India by Prof. Nidhi S. Bisht, Prof Ernesto Noronha and Prof. Arun Kumar Tripathy, published in Information and Organization, shows that the impact of digitalisation is more complex. While technology improves speed, and efficiency, it also reshapes how microfinance works, sometimes in ways that weaken its original social mission by enabling exclusion. The study highlights how weak digital infrastructure, such as lack of internet, intermittent connectivity, and even unreliable electricity, limits last-mile outreach. While earlier manual processes allowed institutions to serve...
Copyright of this story solely belongs to expresscomputer.in. To see the full text click HERE
