Archives: Publication

Financial literacy should not be an occasional campaign or an app feature-it must be an ongoing, evolving journey. In this age of digital transformation, the proliferation of apps, online courses, and gamified learning tools has brought financial education to our fingertips. But the question remains: are we truly learning, or merely consuming content in a digital haze?

Traditionally, financial education in India was sporadic and limited—confined to formal schooling or isolated workshops. However, the economic shocks of the global financial crisis and, more recently, the Covid-19 pandemic revealed a glaring need: widespread, scalable financial literacy for every Indian, regardless of age or income. This urgency accelerated the move toward digital financial education. Digital tools now play a crucial role in disseminating financial knowledge. Online courses, mobile applications, and gamified learning experiences provide users with flexible, self-paced education. Platforms such as Coursera and edX offer courses from top universities, while mobile apps like Mint and YNAB (You Need a Budget) help individuals manage their personal finances interactively. These resources have broadened access to financial education, reaching audiences that traditional methods often failed to engage. Indian institutions followed suit—Sebi launched its investor education app Saa₹thi, while the RBI’s Financial Literacy Week focused on themes like digital banking and cyber safety.

Digital tools undeniably have improved outreach. They break socio-economic and geographical barriers, enabling underserved communities to access financial knowledge. The variety of formats—videos, podcasts, quizzes, simulations—caters to different learning styles. Many mobile apps now integrate behavioural nudges and progress tracking to keep users engaged. This represents a significant shift from the one-size-fits-all model of traditional financial education to a more focused, target-oriented learning style.

Yet this democratization of financial information comes with caveats. The sheer volume of online information risks overwhelming users. People often skim through content without internalizing or applying it. The spread of misinformation—especially through social media influencers, biased advisers, or non-verified blogs—compounds the problem. Add to this the digital divide: rural populations, elderly citizens, and economically disadvantaged groups either lack reliable internet access or digital confidence.

The financial education materials available online require re-orientation with an emphasis on the targeted groups’ needs. Generic modules often fail to consider individual financial circumstances—something only personalized guidance or human intervention can address. As behavioural economists point out, cognitive biases like procrastination, overconfidence, and loss aversion can limit the impact of even the best online tools if not designed with user behaviour in mind.

Importantly, digital literacy without adequate awareness of fraud prevention and grievance redress mechanisms can lead to devastating outcomes. While India has witnessed an exponential rise in UPI and digital payment adoption—with around 172 billion transactions in 2024, marking a 46% increase from 117.64 billion in 2023—this surge has also been accompanied by an alarming rise in scams, phishing attacks, and payment frauds. Victims often lack knowledge about where and how to report such incidents or even recognize that they’ve been defrauded. Without a robust understanding of safe digital practices and redress pathways—like the RBI’s Digital Ombudsman or the Cyber Crime Portal—users remain largely vulnerable and under-confident, especially in semi-urban and rural areas where digital trust is still forming.

Despite several initiatives already in place, India still struggles with translating the availability of digital financial literacy into active public engagement. Regulators and academic institutions like SEBI, NCFE, and NISM have developed accessible e-learning platforms and certification programs—such as the Saa₹thi app, NCFE’s targeted modules, and NISM’s Investor Awareness Web Modules. These offer structured, credible, and even gamified financial education, covering topics like mutual funds, stock markets, savings, and fraud prevention. Yet, awareness of these resources remains alarmingly low. Even among digitally literate individuals, the uptake is limited—either due to lack of trust, interest, or simply the overwhelming nature of financial jargon. For large sections of the population, especially in semi-urban and rural areas, these platforms remain out of reach due to digital exclusion, language barriers, or lack of localized relevance. The gap between resource availability and user participation reveals that creating content is not enough; we must also create demand, trust, and usability, apart from access.

Several countries offer strong examples of how digital financial literacy can be structured, integrated, and sustained. In the United Kingdom, the government-backed Money and Pensions Service (MaPS), along with its MoneyHelper platform, provides a centralized digital hub offering free and impartial financial guidance. It brings together budgeting tools, scam awareness content, and debt advice in one place, while also collaborating with schools to incorporate financial capability into curriculum-based learning. The result is a comprehensive, life-stage approach to financial literacy, supported by both digital access and offline reinforcement.

Similarly, Australia has developed an inclusive model through the Moneysmart platform, operated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). This portal offers financial education tailored to specific age groups and life stages—from schoolchildren to retirees. Its resources include interactive calculators, goal-based planners, and fraud alert systems—all designed in simple, accessible language. The emphasis is on clarity, safety, and user engagement, with financial decision-making contextualized through real-life scenarios.

India can draw valuable lessons from these global models. A unified, government-backed platform—consolidating digital learning resources, grievance redressal portals, helplines, and verified financial tools—can serve as a trusted source amid the current flood of unregulated content. Embedding financial education within formal schooling and higher education, especially using regional languages and culturally relevant examples, can build early awareness and long-term habits. It is equally important that the content reflects real-time risks—updating users on evolving scams, digital payment innovations, and policy shifts. Finally, encouraging deeper collaboration between fintech firms, educators, and regulators can ensure that digital platforms are not just technologically advanced, but also behaviourally intelligent—equipped with built-in nudges, fraud warnings, and default safety mechanisms.

To make digital financial education truly effective, we need to move from passive consumption to active engagement. Hybrid models—blending digital tools with in-person mentorship, community coaching, or AI-driven personalization—can bridge this gap. Schools, colleges, fintech firms, and regulators must co-create programs that combine real-world simulations with culturally relevant case studies and feedback mechanisms.

Financial literacy should not be an occasional campaign or an app feature—it must be an ongoing, evolving journey. Digital tools are powerful, but only when paired with critical thinking, trust in verified knowledge, and the ability to act on it. If we want citizens to make informed economic decisions, we must ensure that our approach to promoting financial education is not just limited to making it accessible, but also authentic, actionable, and inclusive—with grievance redress and fraud awareness forming its core. For broad-based financial sector participation, we need to move beyond clicks and scrolls, develop true understanding and nuances of financial markets, and help in building a sound and meaningful digital economy. As India envisions a Viksit Bharat—a developed and self-reliant nation by 2047—financial empowerment through digitalized financial education is central to that goal.

C S Mohapatra, former IES Officer and currently IEPF Chair Professor and Depannita Ghosh, Research Analyst, NCAER. Views are personal.

India’s economy may stay in a low equilibrium if we do not act to resolve well identified restraints on women taking up employment. A comparison of urban and rural data shows that neither setting is working for women, even if the reasons differ.

As India inches closer to the $5 trillion economy mark with human capital playing a key role, a critical disconnect emerges in this growth story: the disparate contribution of women to the labour force and the economic loss therein.

According to the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2023-24, the literacy rate for urban women stood at 84.9%; yet their labour force participation rate (FLFPR) was only 28%. In contrast, the gap between literacy and work participation for rural women is smaller at 22 percentage points (see data graph).

While this imbalance is universal, even among developed economies like the US, Japan, Germany and Australia where female literacy rates are nearly 100%, there is an almost 40 percentage point gap between literacy and FLFPR (World Bank 2024).

However, developing nations like Vietnam and Bangladesh show a smaller gap of 25 points. India lies in between, with a gap of nearly 33 points (rural-urban combined) but with a lower female literacy rate (74.6% according to PLFS 2023-24).

This reveals a deeper structural and social disconnect that continues to limit women’s economic engagement. Without addressing this gap, our growth milestones risk becoming superficial targets.

This leads us to a deeper question: Are rural women conditioned to seek rural employment over urban or is urban planning failing women?

The differing socio-economic and infrastructural contexts of rural and urban India, perceived as two distinct worlds, shape female labour force outcomes in contrasting ways.

According to PLFS 2023-24, over 92% rural women workers were either self-employed (73.5%) or casual labourers (18.7%), predominantly engaged in agriculture.

In contrast, only 42.3% urban women were self-employed, seeking jobs in the services sector, a domain that—as the World Bank notes—offers women limited returns due to persistent barriers such as restricted mobility, informal work arrangements, concerns around workplace safety and prevailing social norms (South Asia Development Update, 2024).

These structural challenges contribute to what McKinsey described in 2018 as a “leaky pipeline,” where women enter the workforce but steadily drop out before reaching mid- and senior-level roles.

Further compounding this challenge is the role of caregiving, with national data showing women with young children were significantly less likely to be employed (Chatterjee, Desai & Vanneman, 2018; India Human Development Survey).

This effects an often irreversible FLFPR loss, evident among women with school-going children. One pertinent factor driving this trend is the lack of accessible and affordable childcare infrastructure in urban India.

Urban settings—where, according to the National Family Health Survey-5, 61.3% urban households are nuclear—often leave women without the familial support needed to balance caregiving and employment.

In contrast, rural India offers stronger community and family networks that help shoulder childcare responsibilities (Bhindi & Jangra, 2025).

Additionally, flexible work options such as self-employment and agricultural labour are more readily available in rural areas, enabling women to balance paid work and childcare through what Gautham (2022) terms the ‘It takes a village’ effect, unlike the rigid and demanding structure of the urban services sector, which offers fewer adaptable opportunities for working mothers.

There was a notable decline in labour force participation among rural women between 2005 and 2019.

This trend is particularly surprising when viewed against the backdrop of falling fertility rates, increasing consumption, rising household incomes and ongoing urbanization, as these are factors that should in theory support greater female participation.

So why have we seen the opposite?

As household incomes rise, deep-rooted cultural norms can take precedence, reinforcing traditional ideas that cast men as breadwinners and women as caregivers. If the financial need for a woman’s income diminishes, her economic participation can reduce further.

India’s rural FLFPR is persistently higher than its urban FLFPR, despite the latter’s education and infrastructural back-up. Instead, what seems to grow with urbanization is invisible labour.

According to the Time Use Survey 2024, Indian women spend an average of 289 minutes per day on unpaid domestic work, compared to 88 minutes for men.

Urban women, in particular, are burdened with the challenge of juggling professional and domestic responsibilities, often without structural support.

This invisible weight leads to time-bound underemployment, where women may want to work but are unable to find opportunities that align with their caregiving obligations.

These unobserved nuances continue to hold back industrious female employment, both in rural and urban landscapes. Further, the post-covid rise in our rural FLFPR can be partially attributed to crisis-driven fallback strategies, uncharacteristic of provident long-term solutions.

The World Bank estimates that closing the gender gap in employment could boost global GDP by more than 20% (Women, Business and the Law, 2024). But this is as much about equity as it is about lost opportunity.

Increasing the FLFPR can make gender progress a key factor in economic output, address issues that women and children face, and enhance social development overall.

This requires redesigning our labour market with investments in public childcare infrastructure, promoting flexible work models and challenging the notion of caregiving as a woman’s exclusive burden as a few of the necessary steps.

A comparison of rural and urban data shows that neither setting is working for women, even if the reasons for this differ. We need to address our low women’s labour force participation to avert a growth story that may remain stuck in a low equilibrium.

The authors are, respectively, research associate and associate fellow, National Council of Applied Economic Research. Views are personal