AI can help improve credit delivery and contribute meaningfully to fraud detection and risk management

Swaminathan J, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India, has delivered a speech titled AI in Finance: What can change, what must never change. He noted that AI-enabled systems can make customer interaction simpler, more intuitive, and more responsive. Multilingual chatbots and voice-based interfaces can help customers who are not comfortable with formal paperwork or English-language interfaces. Routine queries can be answered faster. Complaints can be tracked better. Information can be delivered more clearly.

AI can also help improve credit delivery. Traditional finance has relied on collateral, financial statements, and standardised credit templates. AI can supplement traditional methods by drawing insights from a wider set of patterns in transaction behaviour, repayment flows and business activity. This can help identify viable borrowers who might otherwise remain excluded. For a country committed to inclusive growth, this is a significant opportunity.

AI can also contribute meaningfully to fraud detection and risk management as well. Modern financial systems generate vast quantities of data. AI can help identify unusual patterns, flag suspicious activity and support faster intervention. This is especially important in payments, where public confidence depends on both convenience and safety. In this sense, AI can contribute not just to speed, but to safety.

There is also a role for AI in compliance and supervision. However, he noted that every powerful technology is a double-edged instrument. If AI is adopted without adequate safeguards, it can amplify existing weaknesses and create entirely new forms of harm. Therefore, the conversation about AI in finance must be balanced.