A THEORETICAL STUDY ON SIGNIFICANCE OF FINANCIAL INCLUSION ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS

Social Science

A universal call was taken by the United Nations Member States to take action towards poverty eradication and earth protection, so that every citizen can experience peace and prosperity by the year 2030. It was the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), that embodies a roadmap for progress leaving no one behind. Merely having less income does not necessarily reflect poverty completely but lacking the basic means, necessarily does. Since banks are the primary provider of basic financial services, banking inclusion or exclusion is often considered as a synonymous term for Financial Inclusion (FI) and exclusion. Many financial exclusion definitions are pure reflections of largely felt social exclusion issues of the society. This theoretical paper provides insights into various implications of the policy of FI on the achievement of SDGs, with primary focus on financial empowerment of citizens. Issues are discussed under economic concerns and suggestions are made to overcome those challenges in achieving SDGs. Publicly available datasets with information on different indicators related to financial services, economic offerings, education, community participation, etc. were reviewed. The findings suggest that to achieve SDG and end exclusion of beings from the dominant notions, evolution must be introduced, accepted and enhanced in academia. This study puts forward a message to bring innovation and transformation in financial literacy to make FI mechanism more inclusive and motivation among all academicians and researchers to take up extensive works in this regard, that will bring equality and eradicate exclusion among beings from the mainstream financial domain.

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