Islamic Banking and Finance in India: A Kosher or Myth

Islamic banking seems to be an unfamiliar concept in Indian economy. Besides having a huge potential, Islamic finance is considered to be infeasible and impractical in Indian conventional system of banking. The search for alternatives to conventional banking in the aftermath of the global financial crisis trained the spotlights on Islamic banking in many parts of the world. Today that Islamic banking has unfortunately been misunderstood in India as a religious charitable venture restricted to the country’s Muslim community. Despite its striking growth in other parts of world such as the Middle East, South East Asia (which chiefly include Malaysia and Indonesia) and Europe, it is yet to be positioned as a realistic alternative financial system and not a religious one. In this paper, an attempt is made to understand the underlying concept of Islamic banking and finance and erode some of the major misconceptions in the same context