Demographic Determinants of Access to Bank Credit

Abstract

The main objective of the paper is to study the determinants of access to bank credit, an important dimension of Financial Inclusion in India. For this purpose we studied if access to bank credit depends on district, gender, education and literacy. The data was collected from Jogulamba with lower literacy rate and Ranga Reddy a semi urban district in the Telangana. A semi structured questionnaire was prepared for the data collection. Regression analysis has been used to analyze the data for the study. Results show that access to credit for districts is significant which is contrary to general belief that in rural areas the credit from banking sector is less. Education is also significant and positive which implies that educated people prefer credit from banks compared to uneducated. This has important implication for policy makers to focus more on education and Financial Inclusion will follow.