A Bank for Infra
The National Bank for Financing Infrastructure and Development promises to address the capital needs of the cash-starved infrastructure sector, but execution remains key
Illustration by Raj Verma
On March 25, the last day of the Covid-19 curtailed Budget Session of Parliament, the government passed a Bill that turned the clock 30 years back to India's pre-economic-liberalisation era in terms of infrastructure financing.
The proposed law that the Rajya Sabha cleared that day (the Lok Sabha had passed it two days earlier) was the National Bank for Financing Infrastructure and Development (NBFID) Bill, 2021. It called for the establishment of a development finance institution (DFI), a tried and tested concept that had led to the birth of institutions, including IFCI (Industrial Finance Corporation of India), IDBI (Industrial Development Bank of India), SIDBI (Small Industries Development Bank of India), NABARD (National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development), etc., in the past.